# Coreboot

31 Hacker News commenters recommended Coreboot and 6 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 10 of 13 months. It meets the Hacker Approved badge rule.

**Verdict:** Open-source replacement for proprietary BIOS firmware on supported boards, giving users control over what runs at boot. Caveat: only a small subset of boards is supported.

## Why people recommend it

- Open source instead of blobs (3 comments): "Framework assembled there, too, but use open source coreboot firmware. Doesn't get any better than that." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47244611)) "Windows running on Core Boot is a better place to be than custom Linux running on opaque blob" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47497907)) "Coreboot is amazing, more machines should have open firmware" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48033011))
- Faster, stronger performance (3 comments): "the Dasharo performance led to effectively the same performance as the default proprietary BIOS performance overall" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48506806)) "It's astonishing how much faster the system is under the coreboot" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49659514)) "coreboot with a tuned config cuts that to under 2 seconds" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47142687))
- Removes vendor lock-ins and features (3 comments): "it has less functionality than the OEM, so you use it to _remove_ features" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47137117)) "in my other old intel CPUs that do have ME I disable it and coreboot" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46602131)) "Mostly, it got rid of Lenovo's stupid WiFi whitelist." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47166423))
- Good on Chromebooks and Starlabs (2 comments): "Some older Arm Chromebooks have mainline Linux support and also run coreboot" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46108876)) "Bravo! This (and coreboot) are why I own a Starbook from Starlabs." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46093193))

## What people warn about

- Few supported boards (2 comments): "They literally do not care anymore; focus is not on corebooting all the boards, but on serving some sort of commercial "customer"." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49811933)) "the biggest one being that only a rather small subset of mobos are actually supported" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49811575))
- Loses functionality versus OEM (2 comments): "it has less functionality than the OEM, so you use it to _remove_ features" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47137117)) "you'll likely lose a bunch of functionality (that's been my experience)" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47136976))
- Missing BIOS password and UI (2 comments): "coreboot doesn't have BIOS password feature" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45953221)) "it didn't have any configuration UI at all" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49811741))
- Closed blobs remain in places (2 comments): "Coreboot doesn't really work well in this situation: multiple vendors, different update lifecycles and possibly closed-source binaries." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48073038)) "Neither is Coreboot which has blobs for many other things." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48703201))

## Alternatives hackers recommend

- [MrChromebox firmware](https://hackerapproved.com/p/mrchromebox-firmware.md): 13 recommend

## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "Coreboot", https://hackerapproved.com/p/coreboot/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).