I’ve been an ubuntu based distro user for the past 3 years of using linux. I’ve heard that updating arch too often can cause problems and what not So i’m just wondering how often i should update my system. Thanks!
From my perspective, the opposite is true. Waiting too long to do updates is more problematic than updating too often.
I would feel free to update as often as you like but I would recommend updating at least once per week.
9 Likes
Welcome @chirp to EndeavourOS. I fully agree with @dalto. Once a week is quite a minimum as with a rolling distro you really feel the benefit when your packages are up-to-date. I myself update at least once a day (but I may be addicted), and NEVER had a problem since I am with EndeavourOS, from last August.
6 Likes
Welcome to the forum $chirp!
So do I. With heavy emphasis on “at least”.
5 Likes
Welcome!
I update 1-2 per week. The only problems I encountered are with hybrid intel/nvidia graphics and there I check the forums for any graphics driver related problems or updates in case. Nvidia is just a pain. There are easy ways to fix things and the community here is always willing to help, you just need to be willing to learn and you will make leaps in your linux knowledge!
Note I also had ephemeral nvidia driver issues with linux mint, so it is not only arch specific.
1 Like
Welcome to the community @chirp. I too am probably addicted as I update at least once a day. No issues for me in doing this.
1 Like
I too update at least once a day.
Welcome to the fun forum 
1 Like
Yeah, that’s misinformation. You can update as often as you want.
The only correct answer to “when should I update” is “whenever you want”, with a caveat that you should not wait too long. As long as you do it at least once every couple of weeks, you should be fine.
1 Like
You can easily check which packages require an update with
checkupdates
More often is generally better, if something goes wrong you have less packages that could have caused the issue, making troubleshooting easier.
Check daily, but there is no set optimal time to apply updates. I would not wait more than a week. If there are large system critical updates (ie new DE version or kernel), maybe wait a day or two and see if others have issues first.
If updating a rolling Arch system often makes you uncomfortable or nervous then consider installing a similar system in Virtualbox and updating that before updating your bare metal system.
Keep a bootable ISO on hand also, if you have to chroot into your system at any stage to fix stuff. I have a separate cloned rescue system for this purpose, but everyone else seemingly just boots the installation ISO and use its live environment.
3 Likes
Every time I sit at my computer I check for updates. So probably 20 times a day.
I have a problem.
6 Likes
I update roughly once or twice a month. And I always update before installing anything new.
Usually I update every Friday
That’s because if something happens I’ll have to weekend to fix it.
6 Likes
I just go by when it needs it (a variable concept). I have several distros on the go, so sometimes one gets left behind a while, and accumulates MANY updates. To me - this means anything over a hundred is MANY.
I have a constantly updated count showing on the screen of pending updates (and on most systems, a scrolling list of what they are) so on the system I’m on updates happen when there are enough of the them, or an interesting one (new kernel, update on something I use a lot etc) while the systems I am NOT currently logged into wait a while (an hour, a day, a week - not often longer). The fun thing is that ALL the choices shown above are correct for the person suggesting it! I like to do it more often than many because 2 minutes once or twice a day is less intrusive to me than 10 minutes twice a week…
Just get 'em done! 
Yeah, I’m using Arch Linux Updates Indicator Gnome Shell Extension running updates almost immediately after notifications pop up. Now THAT’S addictive! 
1 Like
Wow, what a great extension! And me thinking about installing EnOS-Gnome one of these days!
From my point of view, you can not update too often. There is no downside of doing it often.
But waiting too long between updates has a downside: It makes the updates bigger. And if something breaks it is harder to find the root cause and get it fixed in a big update.
If you update often the updates are a lot smaller. Just a handful of packages. If something is going wrong it is a lot easier to spot the bad packages and downgrade them.
1 Like
It even supports AUR! Have a look at the wiki page.
1 Like
I find that I update almost everyday or as soon as an update is notified by checkupdates on my status bar. I have not found a problem with doing it early nor with leaving it for a week or two. The ArchWiki usually lets you know when an update may cause problems and explains how to work around it.
I doubt you need Gnome for the functionality - I can probably put it in a conky for you (assuming you can run conky!) - mine posts a ‘live’ count of pending and ignored, scrolls a list generated by checkupdatesext so I can check what’s coming, and maintains a package count for -Qm and -Qn pacman commands! Nope - no obsession here
1 Like
The pamac-aur package comes with a nice pamac-tray app which is doing notifications about new updates and it can also start the pamac GUI. I am using this on XFCE to be notified and to check the content of each update. But for whatever reason I always do the updates in a terminal with pacman, paru, yay and friends.
1 Like