Linux distributions using musl

• Abyss - An independent Linux distribution based on musl and pure LLVM.
• Adélie Linux - A small, independent Linux distribution focused on delivering a high quality operating environment, aiming for POSIX® compliance, compatibility with a wide variety of computers, and ease of use without sacrificing features.
• Alpine Linux - based on musl since the 3.0 release.
• Ataraxia Linux - Independent, multi-platform, general purpose operating system based on the Linux kernel and musl libc.
  • Supports 17 different CPU architectures
  • Has merged /usr for better compatibility
  • Extremely bleeding edge
  • Uses ZSTD where it’s possible. Kernel, modules and initrd are using ZSTD by default.
• Bedrock Linux - as of version 1.0alpha4
• bootstrap-linux - consists only of a minimal set of packages that can be crosscompiled. kernel, toolchain, busybox.
• Chimera Linux - use musl, LLVM toolchain and FreeBSD userland with Linux kernel
• Cross Linux From Scratch - CLFS uses musl since 16.10.2013 (Announcement)
• Dragora - An independent GNU/Linux-Libre distribution based on concepts of simplicity.
  • Contains 100% free software. Musl is included in Dragora for the 3.0 series (back in 2012).
  • Per-package directories using qi (an own package manager) and graft following the GNU stow’s spirit.
  • /usr merge, offering compatibility with the Filesystem Hierarchy Standard (FHS).
  • Uses sysvinit combined with perp for the supervision of critical services.
  • Supports several architectures via bootstrap, but is currently available for x86 (i586+), x86_64.
• Embedded Linux From Scratch - a fork of CLFS embedded using musl libc
  • 2013-09-28 Updated to correct name of toolchain used
  • 2013-09-14 Updated to musl-0.9.13. Supports *-*-musl* toolchains.
• Exherbo has an x86_64 musl stage.
• Gentoo has stages for most architectures (has musl overlay for packages without mainline support yet)
  • https://distfiles.gentoo.org/releases/amd64/autobuilds/current-stage3-amd64-musl/
  • https://distfiles.gentoo.org/releases/x86/autobuilds/current-stage3-i686-musl/
  • https://distfiles.gentoo.org/releases/arm/autobuilds/
• glaucus - A simple and lightweight Linux® distribution based on musl libc and toybox
• Iglunix - An independent, self-hosting, Linux distribution with no GNU software
• KISS Linux - An independent Linux distribution with a focus on simplicity and the concept of “less is more”.
• Mere Linux
  • Uses pacman for package management and s6 for process supervision
  • Contains instructions for bootstrapping LFS-style
• morpheus - suckless linux distro
• oasis - statically linked linux distribution based on musl and other lightweight components.
• OpenWrt - defaults to musl as libc since 2015 (OpenWrt-commit) except for (as of April 2025) arc CPU ISA (OpenWrt-reference)
• sabotage - experimental Linux distribution based on busybox and musl.
  • About 700 packages including X11, LXDE, alsa, SDL, C++.
  • Supports i386, x86_64, arm, mips, powerpc
  • Uses lightweight replacements for netlink, pkg-config, and gettext
  • Optimized for build speed and small binary size
  • Per-package directories following stow/gobolinux spirit
• Snowflake
  • Includes only of a minimal set of packages that can be crosscompiled. (Kernel, toolchain, busybox, gawk, make and sed)
  • Uses pkgsrc for additional packages, so supports thousands of packages
  • Mainly a platform for testing usrview, a system for per-process views of /usr, for very fine-grained control of package management.
• solyste - statically linked linux distribution targetting embedded hardware and various architectures
• Talos - A modern Linux distribution for Kubernetes.
• TAZ - a Gentoo-based livecd/livedvd
• Vanilla - A radically different, new, simple, customizable Linux distribution based on musl, busybox using LLVM/Clang as toolchain.
• Void Linux provides official musl based images.

Linux distros shipping musl as an optional package

• Arch Linux
• Chromebrew provides an official musl package.
• Debian package is available.
• Fedora package is available starting with Fedora 30.
• Ubuntu package is included in the universe section of the repository starting with Ubuntu 14.04 Trusty Tahr. There is also a PPA available (ppa:bortis/musl) for Saucy Salamander.
• openadk Embedded Linux buildsystem, musl can be selected as the libc of the system.
• Yocto - OpenEmbeeded based Yocto Project supports generated embedded Linux distributions based on musl C library
  • Set TCLIBC = “musl” to switch default C library to musl for building embedded linux platforms
  • poky-tiny ( Yocto Project Reference Distribution ) is now based on musl
  • Yoe Distro - Fully supports Generating musl based images

Other Projects

Third-party projects using or building on musl:

• buildroot toolchain has musl libc option
• docker-muslbase minimal musl-based docker container
• Dwarf Fortress port
• ELLCC is a Clang/LLVM and musl based cross compilation toolchain for embedded systems
• Emscripten is a LLVM-based compiler from C to C++ to JavaScript, using most of musl (some filesystem parts are written in JavaScript)
• Firecracker VMM is an open source virtualization technology that is purpose-built for creating and managing secure, multi-tenant container and function-based services.
• Mirage OS is an Xen guest written in OCaml, its floating-point formatting code is from musl.
• Mission Pinball Framework is an open source framework to program real pinball machines. It uses musl to cross-compile binaries for embedded targets such as Stern Spike.
• mussel The shortest and fastest script to build working cross compilers targeting musl libc
• NodeOS linux with Node.js as userspace
• OSv “cloud” operating system used a musl based libc
• Rust is a programming language with musl supported as a cross-compilation option
• seL4 seL4 kernel ships with musl
• simplecct simple cross compiler toolchain
• toybox simple Unix command-line utilities