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Persistent USB

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A normal Parrot Linux live USB forgets everything when you shut down. With persistence, a second partition on the same USB drive keeps your files, settings and installed packages between boots, so you get a portable Parrot system without installing it on a computer. This guide covers the tool the official documentation recommends and a manual method that works with standard Linux tools.

What you need

  • A USB drive of at least 16 GB (the ISO takes several GB; the rest becomes persistent storage). Everything on it will be erased.
  • A Parrot ISO, verified after download.
  • A Linux computer to prepare the drive (a running Parrot live session is fine).

Method 1: mkusb (recommended)

The official documentation uses mkusb in its “dus” version, which creates the live system and the persistence partition in one go.

  1. Install the dependencies:
    sudo apt update && sudo apt install gdisk dialog zenity -y
  2. Download and install the tool:
    git clone https://github.com/sudodus/tarballs.git
cd tarballs && tar -xf dus-plus.tar.xz
cd dus-tplus/ && sudo ./dus-installer i
  3. Start it with dus (or open guidus from the menu).
  4. Choose i – Install (make a boot device), then p – Persistent live, then p – dus-Persistent.
  5. Select the Parrot ISO and the USB drive. Double-check the drive: it will be overwritten.
  6. Accept the suggested split between persistent storage and the rest, and confirm with Go.

Method 2: by hand

This method writes the ISO with dd and adds a partition labelled persistence, which the live system looks for at boot.

1. Find the USB drive

lsblk

Note the device name of the USB drive, for example /dev/sdb. In the commands below replace /dev/sdX with it. Writing to the wrong device destroys the data on it.

2. Write the ISO

sudo dd if=Parrot-security-7.4_amd64.iso of=/dev/sdX bs=4M status=progress conv=fsync

3. Create the persistence partition

The easiest way is GParted: select the USB drive, create a new ext4 partition in the unallocated space after the existing partitions and give it the label persistence. On the command line:

sudo fdisk /dev/sdX     # n (new), p (primary), accept the defaults, w (write)
lsblk /dev/sdX          # the new partition is the last one, e.g. /dev/sdX3
sudo mkfs.ext4 -L persistence /dev/sdX3

4. Add the configuration file

sudo mkdir -p /mnt/usb
sudo mount /dev/sdX3 /mnt/usb
echo "/ union" | sudo tee /mnt/usb/persistence.conf
sudo umount /mnt/usb

/ union means that changes anywhere in the file system are stored on the persistence partition.

Boot with persistence

Start the computer from the USB drive. If the boot menu has an entry with persistence in its name, choose it. If not, highlight the live entry, press e (UEFI) or Tab (legacy BIOS), add persistence to the end of the line that starts with linux, and boot.

To check that it works, create a file on the desktop, reboot with persistence and see whether it is still there.

Encrypted persistence

A lost USB drive with plain persistence exposes everything on it. Live systems based on Debian’s live-boot can also use a LUKS-encrypted persistence partition (format it with cryptsetup luksFormat before creating the ext4 file system inside it, and boot with persistence persistence-encryption=luks). Test this carefully on your release before you rely on it.

Troubleshooting

  • Changes are lost after reboot: the partition label must be exactly persistence and the file must be named persistence.conf in the root of that partition.
  • No space left: make the persistence partition larger, or clean the APT cache with sudo apt clean.
  • The drive does not boot: rewrite the ISO, and disable Secure Boot in the UEFI settings.

FAQ

How big should the persistence partition be?

At least 4 GB for settings and documents; 16 GB or more if you plan to install extra tools or keep captures and reports on the drive.

Can I update the system on a persistent USB?

Yes, but large upgrades fill the partition quickly and are slow on USB storage. For daily use an installed system or a virtual machine is more practical.

Is persistence the same as installing Parrot on a USB drive?

No. A full installation on the USB drive behaves like an installed system with its own boot loader. Persistence keeps the read-only live image and stores only your changes.