While in the past decade or so Linux desktop/laptop users likely have little to complain about boot times and there hasn't been much emphasis around trying to make boot times even faster on the Linux desktop especially in an era where many systems are always-on and suspend/resume working more reliably these days, boot times are still an important factor in the embedded Linux world. Boot-Time Wizard is one of the new efforts aiming to help embedded Linux makers cut-down on their boot times.

Tim Bird of Sony presented at last week's Embedded Linux Conference in Minneapolis on Linux boot times. He discussed various ongoing efforts for reducing boot times in the embedded Linux world and various ongoing patch activity around it. As part of his boot time crusade at Sony, he developed the Boot-Time Wizard as a means of helping automate the task of tuning the system for better boot time performance. The process is on iterating the boot time performance a change at a time and comparing the results.

Boot-Time Wizard isn't fully automated but requires a human interpreting the results each step of the way. Currently Boot-Time Wizard is considered around an alpha state for the project.

Those wishing to learn more about the Linux boot-time work in 2026 can see this slide deck from the Embedded Linux Conference. Those wanting to explore Boot-Time Wizard for helping to enhance Linux boot performance can find the early-stage project on GitHub.