How to upgrade to Ubuntu 18.04 LTS now

Now that Ubuntu 18.04 LTS is officially released, you may want to upgrade your current Ubuntu installation to the Bionic Beaver.  In this article, we will present you guides that will let you upgrade Ubuntu 16.04, 16.10, 17.04, and 17.10 to Ubuntu 18.04. The update is not yet pushed through the software update.

Typically, it takes around a week or two for the upgrade notification to propagate through entire repository sources. If you can wait until then, it seems like you are very patient and that’s a cool thing. But like me, if you can’t wait for so long, there is a way to force the upgrade from the command line.

Upgrade to Ubuntu 18.04 LTS ‘Bionic Beaver’

Method 1: GUI Way

If you prefer GUI way of doing things, you can try upgrading to Ubuntu 18.04 from Software Update.

Step 1) Click “Activities”, and then launch “Software Update”.

Step 2) In the “Updates” tab, make sure you have selected either “For any new version” or “FOr long-term support versions”. Click “Close”.

Software Update

Step 3) If anything is changed, it will populate and prompts you to update the outdated information. GO ahead and click “Yes”.

Step 4)  Launch Update Manager once more. If upgrade has propagated into the official repository source, you should see a notification that will tell you that a new distribution is available.

Step 5) Click ‘Upgrade’.

Ubuntu 18.04 Upgrade Notification

Step 6) Proceed with on-screen instructions to finish upgrading. After installation is complete, it will ask you to reboot the PC for the Linux Kernel 4.15 to take into effect.

Welcome to Ubuntu 18.04

Restart Computer

If you don’t see the notification, don’t worry, the upgrade has not yet propagated into all sources yet. You can try some other day. Or you can upgrade now from the Terminal by command line way.

How to force Upgrade to Ubuntu 18.04 now?

Step 1) Launch “Terminal”.

Step 2) Enter the following commands one at a time and press enter.

sudo apt update 
sudo apt upgrade
sudo apt dist-upgrade

Do you see a message that new Bionic packages are available? If yes, proceed to follow the terminal instructions. You will have to enter the root password and ‘y’ when prompted.

Step 3) On the other hand, if you see no new packages are available, enter this command:

sudo do-release-upgrade -d

Step 4) This time you must need the notification of Bionic package availability as shown below:

Force Ubuntu 18.04 Update

Step 5) Press enter key when it asks to confirm “Third party sources disabled”.

Upgrading to Ubuntu 18.04

Step 6) In the next screen, you will see the overall summary of what’s going to happen next. This is the step from where there is no turning back. So make sure you are all set. If you are upgrading your laptop, check if you have enough battery juice or simply plug it into power.

Summary of what’s going to happen

Step 7) Enter ‘y’ when you see a prompt to remove obsolete packages. This will free up some disk space.

Continue to remove obsolete packages

Step 8) Finally, enter ‘y’ and hit enter to let your computer to reboot for Bionic Beaver to take into effect.

Enjoy your brand new Bionic Beaver and its new features! If everything went well, you should see the brand new Ubuntu 18.04 welcome screen.

Ubuntu 18.04 New Welcome Screen