Ventoy 1.1.18

Ventoy is the free, open-source tool that turns one USB stick into a boot drive for Windows, Linux and rescue ISOs at once, so you copy files instead of reformatting, unlike single-image writers such as Rufus.

Updated: Oct 9, 2026
Size: 15.9MB
Downloads: 21.3K
This week: 246See the Top 20 downloads this week

Ventoy turns one USB stick into a boot drive for as many ISO files as will fit on it.

You install it on the stick once, then copy ISO files across like ordinary files, and Ventoy shows them as a menu every time you boot.

It is free, open source, and runs on Windows and Linux, with no ads and no paid version.

What Ventoy Actually Does - in Plain Terms

Tools like Rufus write one ISO to a USB stick and wipe whatever was there before. Want a different operating system next week, and you start again.

Ventoy works the other way round. It puts a small boot loader on the stick, and from then on the stick behaves like a normal drive: drop in a Windows installer, two Linux distros and a rescue disk, and all four appear in the boot menu.

Many systems, one stick. ISO, WIM, IMG, VHD, VHDX and EFI files boot directly, with nothing to extract.
Big files are fine. ISOs larger than 4 GB work, so full Windows installers and large Linux images fit.
Wide hardware support. Legacy BIOS and UEFI on 32-bit and 64-bit PCs, plus ARM64 and MIPS64 UEFI systems.
Secure Boot support. It boots on PCs with Secure Boot switched on, after a one-time key step covered below.
Still a normal USB drive. Spare space holds ordinary files, so the same stick carries documents too.

The developers list over 1,400 tested images and say more than 90% of the distributions on DistroWatch's popularity list boot. Our guide to copying multiple ISOs to one USB drive with Ventoy walks through it with screenshots.

How to Set Up a Ventoy USB Drive

Download the Windows zip from the Ventoy download page and extract it to a folder.
Plug in the USB stick, run Ventoy2Disk.exe, check the right drive is selected, and click Install.
Copy your ISO files onto the stick in File Explorer, into any folder you like.
Restart the PC, open its boot menu (usually F12, F11, Esc or F8 at power-on) and choose the USB stick.

Installing wipes the stick.

The first install erases everything on the USB drive, so copy anything important off it first. Later updates use the Update button in the same tool and keep your ISO files in place.

On Linux, the tar.gz package carries Ventoy2Disk.sh and a web-based installer that do the same job. With no working PC at all, the LiveCD ISO boots on its own and installs Ventoy to a stick from there.

Fix "Verification failed: (0x1A) Security Violation"

That blue screen on the first boot is Secure Boot, not a broken stick. Your PC does not recognise Ventoy's boot loader yet, and it only needs telling once.

Press a key to open the MOK manager screen, then choose Enroll key from disk.
Select the small VTOYEFI volume and pick the ENROLL_THIS_KEY_IN_MOKMANAGER.cer file.
Choose Continue, then Yes, then Reboot - the menu appears normally from then on, on that PC.

If you would rather not enroll a key, switching Secure Boot off in the firmware settings also works. Note that Windows 11 expects Secure Boot on, so turn it back on afterwards.

When an ISO Will Not Boot

A small number of images refuse to boot through Ventoy. When that happens, press Ctrl+R on the image in the menu to try GRUB2 mode, or Ctrl+W for WIMBOOT mode on Windows images, before giving up on it.

If it still fails, write that one ISO to its own stick with Rufus or balenaEtcher. Some vendor recovery images and older installers simply expect to own the whole drive.

Who Should Look Elsewhere

The tell is how many systems you need on the stick. For one ISO you will write once and forget, a single-purpose writer is just as quick and has fewer moving parts.

If you want to	Use this instead
Write one Windows or Linux ISO, with options like TPM checks removed	Rufus
Flash a Raspberry Pi or Linux image as simply as possible	balenaEtcher
Boot ISOs over the network on many PCs, with no USB at all	iVentoy, from the same developer
Run Windows itself from a USB drive, not just install it	WinToUSB Free
Use a different multiboot tool with its own menu	YUMI
Back up or clone a whole drive	Clonezilla, which itself boots fine from Ventoy

What to Put on It

A Windows 11 installer, your favourite Linux distro and a rescue system covers most emergencies. Our guide to making a Windows recovery USB explains what a recovery drive does that an installer does not.

For Linux newcomers, the bootable Ubuntu USB guide covers choosing and testing a distro, and the ISO works just as well dropped onto a Ventoy stick. If you still need an older system, Windows 7 in 2026 covers where to get it legally.

A larger, faster drive makes a real difference once you carry several big installers. USB stick vs SSD covers which to buy, and ImgDrive lets you mount and check an ISO in Windows before you copy it across.

The HDD, SSD and USB tools category has the rest of the boot and drive utilities.

Quick questions

Is Ventoy safe?

Yes. It is open source, so its code is public, and it carries no ads or bundled software. The developers recommend checking the SHA-256 hash of the download against the one they publish.

Will installing Ventoy erase my USB drive?

The first install does, so back up anything on it. After that, updating Ventoy and adding or removing ISO files leaves everything else alone.

Can I install Windows 11 from a Ventoy USB?

Yes. Copy the Windows 11 ISO onto the stick and pick it from the boot menu. On a PC with Secure Boot on, enroll Ventoy's key the first time, as described above.

How many ISO files can I put on one stick?

As many as fit. There is no set limit, and files larger than 4 GB are fine.

Ventoy or Rufus?

Ventoy if you want several systems on one stick and like adding new ones by copying a file. Rufus if you need one ISO written with extra options, such as a Windows 11 installer that skips the hardware checks.

Can I still use the stick for normal files?

Yes. The Ventoy partition is an ordinary drive in Windows, so documents and other files can sit beside the ISOs.

Download Ventoy 1.1.18 and see how many systems you can fit on one stick, or tell us how you got on if you have used it before.