OpenBSD pkg tools¶

ID: pkg-tools
Home page: https://man.openbsd.org/pkg_add
Platforms: 🅱️ BSD (OpenBSD only)
Operations: installed · orphans · search · install · upgrade · upgrade_all · remove · cleanup
purl types: pkg:pkg-tools
CLI name: pkg_info
Extra search paths: /usr/sbin
Issues and PRs: 📦 manager: pkg-tools
Source: meta_package_manager/managers/pkg_tools.toml

OpenBSD’s pkg tools are the base system’s package suite, spanning three binaries: pkg_info (queries), pkg_add (install/upgrade) and pkg_delete (remove/cleanup).

Parsing notes, verified against the pkg_add/pkg_info/pkg_delete man pages (man.openbsd.org), the OpenBSD FAQ 15, and the OpenBSD::PkgInfo/Update Perl source:

None of the three binaries has a version flag (-V and -v mean progress/verbose): the suite ships with the base system and is versioned with the OS, so the version probe runs uname -r instead (like “7.7”).
Package names fuse “stem-version” with OpenBSD’s pN patch suffix and optional flavor tails (unzip-6.0p17, unzip-6.0p17-iconv): the version capture starts at the last dash before a digit and absorbs any flavor tail.
Packages are located through /etc/installurl, configured by default on modern OpenBSD: there is no local index to refresh, hence no sync operation. Outdated is omitted too: pkg_add -u -n -v interleaves progress meters and can list several candidates per package, which defeats per-line parsing.
-I forces non-interactive mode on every mutating call (the default is interactive on a terminal). Mutations need root: OpenBSD’s base convention is doas, but mpm’s escalation runs through sudo (available as a package).

What `mpm` adds to `pkg-tools`¶

Through mpm, pkg-tools gains --exact and --extended search, to narrow to exact names or match descriptions.

Bigger still, mpm reaches across every manager at once: mpm installed and mpm outdated cover pkg-tools alongside every other manager you run in one table, mpm upgrade --all updates them together, and mpm sbom exports the whole machine as one bill of materials.

Every mpm command also gains --dry-run and --plan previews, cross-scheme version comparison and purl identifiers. See manager augmentations for how each one is built.

Your `pkg-tools` commands, in `mpm`¶

You already know pkg-tools: each operation maps one-to-one onto mpm, in an interface shared by every manager.

To…	With `pkg-tools`	With `mpm`
List what’s installed	`pkg_info -I -a`	`mpm --pkg-tools installed`
Search for a package	`pkg_info -Q <query>`	`mpm --pkg-tools search <query>`
Install a package	`pkg_add -I <package_id>`	`mpm install pkg:pkg-tools/<package_id>`
Upgrade one package	`pkg_add -u -I <package_id>`	`mpm --pkg-tools upgrade <package_id>`
Upgrade everything	`pkg_add -u -I`	`mpm --pkg-tools upgrade --all`
Remove a package	`pkg_delete -I <package_id>`	`mpm remove pkg:pkg-tools/<package_id>`
List orphaned dependencies	`pkg_delete -a -I -n`	`mpm --pkg-tools orphans`

Prefix any command above with --dry-run to simulate the underlying manager calls without touching the system: the safe way to watch what mpm would do before trusting it.

Operations¶

Operation	Supported	Notes
`installed`	✓
`outdated`
`orphans`	✓
`search`	✓	exact and extended search backfilled by `mpm`
`install`	✓
`upgrade`	✓
`upgrade_all`	✓
`remove`	✓
`sync`
`cleanup`	✓	`--orphans` runs the system-wide orphan sweep
`doctor`

Selecting and configuring `pkg-tools`¶

Deselect pkg-tools for a single run with --no-pkg-tools, or persist the choice in your configuration:

[mpm]
pkg-tools = false

Keep it enabled but tune how mpm drives it with a per-manager override:

[mpm.managers.pkg-tools]
timeout = 900

mpm config-template pkg-tools prints every overridable attribute as a ready-to-paste block.

Recipes¶

A few jobs you would otherwise script around pkg-tools, one mpm command each:

Snapshot and clone a machine: mpm --pkg-tools dump pkg-tools.toml, then mpm restore pkg-tools.toml on the next one.
Export a compliance SBOM: mpm --pkg-tools sbom (CycloneDX by default, --spdx for SPDX).

Privilege escalation¶

System-wide manager: mpm wraps its privileged operations in sudo out of the box. Instead of letting the tool prompt mid-run, mpm primes the credential cache up-front, with a single branded password prompt at most. Turn escalation off for rootless setups with --no-sudo or the per-manager sudo override.

Root is required for its cleanup_orphan, install, remove, upgrade, upgrade_all operations.

See privilege escalation for the full policy.

Cooldown¶

State of OpenBSD pkg tools’s release-age gating, from the cooldown support table:

Status: ❌ None (OpenBSD, per-release curated)

A cooldown only pays off where a compromised release can be withdrawn while the clock runs, and can only be emulated where the registry dates its releases. From the retraction table:

Registry: Distro binary archives (pkg:deb, pkg:rpm, pkg:alpm, pkg:apk)
Retraction: Index revert: removal is an archive operation and the mirror is rebuilt without the package. Debian, for one, requires filing an RM: bug against ftp.debian.org (developers-reference)
Publish date: ❌ the version string is the distro maintainer’s build, carrying no upstream publication date

With --cooldown set, mpm skips this manager’s install and upgrade operations rather than run them unguarded (fail-closed); --allow-unsupported-managers opts back in.

Version probe¶

The version is probed by running:

$ uname -r
7.7

and extracted with:

r"^(?P<version>[\d.]+)"

Reference traces¶

Raw native outputs captured in the bundled definition: the reference mpm’s parsers were written against. If you know OpenBSD pkg tools well and a transcript below looks wrong, or a newer release changed its output format, report it.

$ pkg_info -I -a
unzip-6.0p17        Extract files from ZIP archives
lunzip-1.14p0       Lzip decompressor

$ pkg_delete -a -I -n
autoconf-2.71p2: ok
automake-1.16.5: ok

$ pkg_info -Q {query}
lunzip-1.14p0
unzip-6.0p17 (installed)
unzip-6.0p17-iconv

Feed any of these through mpm and the raw output becomes one uniform table, the same shape for every manager: filter it, project columns, or export it (mpm --pkg-tools installed --output json, or csv, toml, yaml), each package carrying a purl and a version comparable across managers.

Changelog¶

7.4.0 (2026-07-25)
- Their cleanup commands, both orphan sweeps (cave purge, pkg_delete -a), are re-declared as cleanup_orphan: cleanup --orphans now reaches them and cleanup --cache leaves them alone.
- Plain cleanup no longer removes orphaned packages: their native sweeps moved behind cleanup --orphans. This also stops emerge’s cleanup from triggering its pre-depclean world upgrade unless --orphans is given.
7.2.0 (2026-07-09)
- Add OpenBSD’s pkg tools (pkg_add/pkg_info/pkg_delete) with installed, search, install, upgrade, remove and cleanup support; a bundled configuration-defined manager.