# Installing Varnish

With open source software, you can choose to install binary packages or compile it yourself from source code. To install a package or compile from source is a matter of personal taste. If you don’t know which method to choose, we recommend that you read this whole section and then choose the method you feel most comfortable with.

Unfortunately, something as basic as installing a piece of software is highly operating system specific:

- Installing on Debian/Ubuntu
  - From package
  - Official packages of 6
  - Official packages of 4.1
- Installing on FreeBSD
  - From package
  - From ports
- Installing on OpenBSD
  - From package
  - From ports
- Installing on RedHat or CentOS
  - Official packages of 6
  - External packaging

# Compiling Varnish from source

If there are no binary packages available for your system, or if you want to compile Varnish from source for other reasons:

- Compiling Varnish from source
  - Getting hold of the source
  - Build dependencies on FreeBSD
  - Build dependencies on Debian / Ubuntu
  - Build dependencies on Red Hat / CentOS
  - Build dependencies on macOS
  - Build dependencies on Alpine Linux
  - Build dependencies on a SmartOS Zone
  - Building on Solaris and other Solaris-ish OSes
  - Compiling Varnish
  - Installing

# Other pre-built Varnish packages

Here is a list of the ones we know about:

- ArchLinux package and ArchLinux wiki

- Alpine Linux

- UPLEX Packages with various vmods for Debian, Ubuntu and RHEL/CentOS