I downloaded a Debian install live cd off the main website and found out I got Debian 11, which is not officially released yet... Since I want to go for testing either way, what are some drawbacks of sticking with 11 vs 10? Is 10 significantly more stable?
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If you want to “go for testing”, stick with what you’ve got — Debian testing is (currently) what will become Debian 11. Debian 10 hasn’t been “testing” since its release two years ago.
As far as stability goes, testing is currently frozen in preparation for release and is getting ever closer to what will be released; at this point nothing much should change. So current testing is pretty much as usable as Debian 11 will be upon release. Compared to Debian 10, that should be pretty good; all the bugfixes that have gone into Debian 10 are in Debian 11 too. Of course, Debian 11 adds two years’ worth of bugs to the mix, along with two years of upstream fixes, and that’s what testing is all about. However in my experience Debian testing currently is as usable as Debian 10.
See What does it mean for a Linux distribution to be stable and how much does it matter for casual users? for some background on what stability means in Debian, and How can we predict when the next Debian release will be out? for a discussion of Debian release dates.
Stephen Kitt
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My organization's experience with the upgrade has been seamless. The port from `gcc8` to `gcc10` took minor effort, but once that was out of the way I have only been given positive feedback. Modern hardware does work better with the latest kernel. If I were to start from scratch, I'd choose debian 11. But if I were the super skeptical type, I'd be comfortable installing deb10 now, knowing that the upgrade from debian10 to debian11 works so well. – Stewart Jun 24 '21 at 19:31
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Debian 11 (bullseye) will be in full-freeze on 17 July 2021. That means Debian 11 will be relased shortly afterward.
It is currently in Hard freeze, so don't expect many changes between now and the full release. It's pretty stable and I've already started migrating my organization over. You can find a list of release critical bugs on bugs.debian.org. If you don't think those release-critical bugs will affect you, then you can choose to stick with the debian 11 version which will become stable this summer. That will save you the hassle of upgrading later.
If you choose to go with debian 10, then you'll be choosing 2-year old software. If you need tried-tested-and-true, then this might be perfect for you. If you choose to go with Debian 11, then you'll be choosing something more recent which is not guaranteed to work, but has undergone a few months of scrutiny already, is pretty close to being released, and will have a few more years of support.
Stewart
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