How Do I Set Up Partitions When Installing Linux?

For a deeper understanding, check out the Arch Wiki; it's full of valuable information on partitioning and more. Even if you're not installing Arch, the insights can be really beneficial. And remember, when installing, always take regular backups and feel free to experiment in a virtual machine to get comfortable!

If you're new to this, I recommend letting the installer handle the partitioning for you. Most beginner-friendly distributions like Linux Mint are designed to take care of this automatically, so you won't have to worry about partitions or mounting things manually.

When you're setting up Linux, you typically just need two main partitions: the root and the EFI system partition (ESP). The root partition is where your system files will live, and it's best to format it as ext4 since that's the standard for most Linux distributions. The ESP, on the other hand, should be formatted as FAT32 and can be about 512MB, which is usually plenty. It's wise to keep your home directory on a separate partition, which can make reinstalls easier. Just a tip: if you're not sure about partitioning, using a swap file instead of a swap partition can simplify things.

Just a heads-up, it's actually a good idea to make your EFI partition larger than 512MB—4GB or more if you plan on keeping multiple kernels and initramfs images. That way, you won’t run into space issues down the line.