Requirements

Linux

• Distribution: Arch, Debian/Ubuntu, Fedora-based, or omarchy
• Podman: rootless, with systemd user session active
• crun: recommended OCI runtime for rootless Podman
• DNS resolver: NetworkManager or systemd-resolved (at least one is required for .test DNS)
• systemctl --user functional: run loginctl enable-linger $USER if needed

Linger must be enabled

If systemctl --user units do not survive logout, run:

loginctl enable-linger $USER

This is required for Podman Quadlet containers to start automatically and persist across sessions.

crun is the recommended OCI runtime

Most distributions ship crun as the default rootless Podman runtime. On Arch-based systems, runc is the default and crun must be installed separately. While both runtimes work, crun is lighter and purpose-built for rootless containers. lerd doctor will warn if crun is not installed.

# Arch / omarchy
sudo pacman -S crun

# Debian / Ubuntu
sudo apt install crun

# Fedora
sudo dnf install crun

• unzip: used during install to extract fnm
• certutil / nss-tools: for mkcert to install the CA into Chrome/Firefox
  • Arch: nss
  • Debian/Ubuntu: libnss3-tools
  • Fedora: nss-tools

Go is only needed to build from source

The released binary is fully static with no runtime dependencies. You do not need Go installed to use Lerd.

macOS

• macOS 13 Ventura or later: Apple Silicon (arm64) or Intel (amd64)
• Homebrew: used to install lerd and its Podman dependency
• Podman: installed automatically as a Homebrew dependency of lerd
• Podman Machine: lerd install boots and configures it on first run
• Xcode Command Line Tools: required by Homebrew (xcode-select --install if missing)

DNS, the local CA (mkcert), and nginx are all set up by lerd install. No system-level resolver configuration is needed; macOS picks up .test lookups from /etc/resolver/test which lerd writes for you.

Podman Machine memory

On first start lerd sizes the Podman Machine VM based on your host RAM so 8 GB MacBooks aren't squeezed while larger machines get headroom for heavier workloads.

Host RAM	Podman Machine memory
≤ 8 GB	3 GB
9-31 GB	4 GB
≥ 32 GB	6 GB

The memory value is a ceiling, not a reservation: the VM only uses what your containers actually request. If sites slow down under load on an 8 GB host, bump the VM manually:

podman machine stop
podman machine set --memory 4096
podman machine start