Updating from older versions

Follow the instructions below to update Anaconda to the latest version.

  • Windows: Open Anaconda Prompt.
  • macOS or Linux: Open a terminal window.

Note

These steps assume you are starting in the base environment created by the installer.

To update to the latest version of Anaconda, enter these commands:

#update the conda package manager to the latest version
conda update conda
#use conda to update Anaconda to the latest version
conda update anaconda

To update to a specific version of Anaconda, enter these commands:

#update the conda package manager to the latest version
conda update conda
#use conda to install a specific version of Anaconda
conda install anaconda=VERSION-NUMBER

More information

The below content provides more details about what is happening when you update Anaconda.

conda install anaconda=VERSION-NUMBER grabs the specific release of the Anaconda metapackage; for example, conda install anaconda=2022.05. That metapackage represents a pinned state that has undergone testing as a collection. Read more about metapackages.

There is a special “custom” version of the Anaconda metapackage that has all the package dependencies, but none of them are constrained. The “custom” version is lower in version ordering than any actual release number. conda install anaconda=VERSION-NUMBER may remove packages if the new metapackage that is replacing your old one has removed packages. As of conda 4.7, when a package loses its connection to the set of specs that have been requested in the past, it gets removed.

See all of the available Anaconda versions.

conda update --all will unpin everything. This updates all packages in the current environment to the latest version. In doing so, it drops all the version constraints from the history and tries to make everything as new as it can.

Removing packages has the same behavior. If any packages are orphaned by an update, they are removed. conda update --all may not be able to make everything the latest versions because you may have conflicting constraints in your environment.

With Anaconda 2019.07’s newer Anaconda metapackage, conda update --all will make the metapackage go to the custom version in order to update other specs.

conda update --all will only update the selected environment. If you have other environments you’d like to update, update them in the command line with the following:

conda update -n myenv --all

When you use conda update pkgName or conda install pkgName, conda may not be able to update or install that package without changing something else you specified in the past.

In the case of the Anaconda metapackage, when you enter conda update ipython but you have Anaconda 2019.03 currently installed, conda can and should “downgrade” Anaconda to the “custom” version so that iPython can be updated.

When conda cannot fulfill the request for the latest package available, it usually means that newer packages exist for your spec but are in conflict. To force the change, try conda install <PACKAGE_NAME>=<NEW_VERSION>.