Earlier this week, the Raspberry Pi Foundation announced the beta release of a new firmware update featuring a bootloader with USB boot support on the Raspberry Pi 4 . This new update should make the USB boot process much easier to set up on the latest Raspberry Pi .

While we've ran the Raspberry Pi off an SSD before, the Raspberry Pi 4 has lacked USB boot functionality since launch. This new update will allow complete USB boot support, eliminating the need for a microSD card entirely. With the beta firmware, Pi 4 owners can boot operating systems using USB 3.0. You can read more about the bootloader configuration on the Raspberry Pi website .

How to Boot Raspberry Pi Off USB

If you want to be able to boot your Raspberry Pi off USB, take note of the below.

Since this is a beta, early adopters have to manually update the bootloader. The process is easy enough, though. You'll need to load the latest edition of the Raspbian operating system onto a microSD card and run the firmware update from a terminal. After rebooting, the new beta bootloader will go into effect.

If you'd like to get in on the beta, follow the detailed steps posted on the Raspberry Pi forums . You will need a microSD card to enable the new USB functions, but after that, the microSD card is totally optional.