Ventoy — Create Bootable USB Drives with Multiple ISOs

Introduction

Ventoy eliminates the tedious cycle of formatting USB drives every time you need a different bootable image. Instead of writing one ISO at a time, you install Ventoy once on a USB stick and then simply copy as many ISO, WIM, IMG, VHD, or EFI files as your drive can hold. On boot, Ventoy presents a menu to choose which image to start.

What Ventoy Does

• Boots ISO/WIM/IMG/VHD/EFI files directly without extraction or reformatting
• Supports multiple image files on a single USB drive simultaneously
• Works with both Legacy BIOS and UEFI Secure Boot
• Handles images larger than 4 GB on FAT32 via automatic file splitting
• Supports persistence for live Linux distributions across reboots

Architecture Overview

Ventoy installs a custom bootloader into the first partition of the USB drive and creates a second exFAT or FAT32 data partition for storing image files. At boot time, the Ventoy bootloader scans the data partition, builds a menu of all recognized image files, and uses direct disk mapping to boot the selected image without unpacking it. The bootloader supports both Legacy BIOS (via GRUB-like chain) and UEFI (with its own signed EFI binary for Secure Boot).

Self-Hosting & Configuration

• Download the installer from the GitHub releases page for Linux, Windows, or LiveCD
• Run the installer once to set up the Ventoy bootloader on your USB drive
• Copy image files to the data partition using any file manager or CLI
• Customize boot menu appearance and behavior via a ventoy.json config file on the drive
• Update Ventoy in place without losing existing image files using the update command

Key Features

• No reformatting needed when switching between OS images
• Supports over 1000 tested ISO files including Windows, Linux, and rescue disks
• Theme and menu customization through JSON-based configuration
• Plugin system for auto-install scripts, persistence, and boot parameters
• Cross-platform installer available for Windows and Linux

Comparison with Similar Tools

• Rufus — writes one ISO at a time and requires reformatting for each new image
• balenaEtcher — simple single-image writer with no multi-boot support
• YUMI — supports multi-boot but uses older syslinux approach with less broad compatibility
• MultiBootUSB — similar concept but discontinued and less actively maintained

FAQ

Q: Does Ventoy support Windows installation ISOs? A: Yes. Ventoy can boot official Windows 10/11 installation ISOs directly, including ones larger than 4 GB.

Q: Will Secure Boot work? A: Ventoy supports UEFI Secure Boot through its own enrollment process. You may need to enroll the Ventoy certificate on first boot.

Q: Can I still use the USB drive for normal file storage? A: Yes. The data partition works as a regular drive. ISO files and personal files coexist.

Q: How do I update Ventoy without losing my ISOs? A: Use the update option in the installer. It upgrades the bootloader partition while preserving all files on the data partition.

Sources

• https://github.com/ventoy/Ventoy
• https://www.ventoy.net/en/index.html