Adding a new board or board family¶

Armbian describes hardware with two kinds of configuration file:

a board config — one file per board, under config/boards/, naming the board and pointing it at a family, a U-Boot config and a device tree;
a board family config — one file per SoC family, under config/sources/families/, holding everything shared by the boards of that family (kernel source, U-Boot branch, CPU limits, family tweaks).

A board config selects its family with BOARDFAMILY, and the build merges the two at run time. If your board belongs to an SoC family Armbian already supports, you usually only need a new board config. A genuinely new SoC needs a new family as well.

Board config¶

Create config/boards/<board>.<status>. The file name without its extension is the BOARD identifier you pass to the build, e.g. config/boards/bananapim5.conf → ./compile.sh build BOARD=bananapim5.

Status suffix¶

The extension records the board’s support status (shown at the login prompt and used by the board selector):

Extension	Meaning
`.conf`	Standard support — an active maintainer ships stable images
`.csc`	Community-supported config — community creations or no active maintainer
`.tvb`	TV box — community-maintained, same tier as `.csc`
`.wip`	Work in progress — a maintainer has committed but images are not yet stable
`.eos`	End of service — no longer maintained

New boards without a committed maintainer typically start as .csc (or .wip while bring-up is ongoing). See the Board Support Rules for what each tier requires.

Key fields¶

A minimal board config sets the identity, the family, and the boot/kernel pointers:

Bash
# Amlogic S905X3 quad core 2-4GB RAM SoC eMMC GBE USB3 SPI
BOARD_NAME="Banana Pi M5"          # "COMPANY PRODUCT VERSION"; used for hostname/welcome text
BOARD_VENDOR="sinovoip"
BOARDFAMILY="meson-sm1"            # the family file in config/sources/families/
BOARD_MAINTAINER="igorpecovnik"    # space-separated GitHub logins (empty for unmaintained)
INTRODUCED="2021"                  # year the board reached the market
BOOTCONFIG="bananapi-m5_defconfig" # U-Boot defconfig name (see the u-boot configs/ tree)
BOOT_FDT_FILE="amlogic/meson-sm1-bananapi-m5.dtb"  # device tree, relative to the dtb dir
KERNEL_TARGET="current,edge"       # which kernel branches to build (legacy/current/edge)
KERNEL_TEST_TARGET="current"       # subset built by CI / release automation
SERIALCON="ttyAML0"                # serial console device (optionally :baud)

Commonly-used extras include HAS_VIDEO_OUTPUT, BOOT_LOGO, MODULES_BLACKLIST, DEFAULT_OVERLAYS, OVERLAY_PREFIX, IMAGE_PARTITION_TABLE, BOOTFS_TYPE, CPUMIN/CPUMAX, and PACKAGE_LIST_BOARD. The board file can also define hook functions for board-specific steps — the Banana Pi M5 config, for example, fetches Amlogic FIP blobs and post-processes U-Boot via fetch_sources_tools__… and post_uboot_custom_postprocess__… hooks.

Full field reference

Every board option is documented in Board configuration. If a field is unclear, grep the framework for it:

Bash
grep -r -A5 -B5 "BOOT_FDT_FILE" lib/ config/

Board family config¶

If the SoC family is new, add config/sources/families/<family>.conf (its name is what boards set as BOARDFAMILY). The family config carries what all its boards share:

Kernel source and branch per BRANCH — KERNELSOURCE, KERNELBRANCH, KERNEL_MAJOR_MINOR, KERNELPATCHDIR, LINUXCONFIG.
U-Boot source and patch dir — BOOTBRANCH, BOOTPATCHDIR (a board can override with BOOTBRANCH_BOARD / BOOTPATCHDIR).
Architecture and platform — ARCH, and often a shared include via source "${BASH_SOURCE%/*}/include/<soc>_common.inc".
CPU limits and governor — CPUMIN, CPUMAX, GOVERNOR.
Hook functions — e.g. family_tweaks(), uboot_custom_postprocess(), write_uboot_platform().

The BOARDFAMILY → build-time family mapping is listed in config/sources/README.md.

Kernel and U-Boot patches¶

Board- and family-specific patches live under patch/kernel/ and patch/u-boot/, in the directory named by the family’s KERNELPATCHDIR / BOOTPATCHDIR. Kernel config fragments live in config/kernel/linux-<family>-<branch>.config (regenerate with ./compile.sh rewrite-kernel-config).

Test before you submit¶

Build and boot-test each kernel target you declared:

Bash
./compile.sh build BOARD=<board> BRANCH=current

Write the image to media, confirm it boots to a login prompt over serial and/or network, and check the peripherals the board is expected to support. Bring-up that isn’t ready for stable images belongs in .wip.

Submit¶

Open a pull request against armbian/build with the new config (and any patches). Set BOARD_MAINTAINER to your GitHub login if you intend to maintain it, and pick the status suffix that matches your commitment. The Board Support Rules describe the obligations of each tier.