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T
TTFN
New Member
February 13, 2026
Question

Boot From Alternate Partition After Upgrade

  • February 13, 2026
  • 1 reply
  • 761 views

Hi all,

 

Can someone please explain to me this option in Firmware Templates...

 

From the guide:

 

Applies only to FortiGates.

Select to upgrade the inactive partition. Clear to skip the inactive partition during upgrade.

Selecting this option causes the device to reboot twice during the upgrade process: first to upgrade the inactive partition, and second to boot back into the active partition.

 

So does this mean that if I had a device running 7.6.5 (active partition) and 7.6.4 (non active partition) and I pushed 7.6.6 and specified this option it would:

Reboot and overwrite 7.6.4 in the non-active partition, then reboot back into 7.6.5?

I am confused by this as I have recently done an upgrade by FortiManager without this option set which appears to have installed into the non active partition and booted into this (Which was the alternate partition?)...

1 reply

Toshi_Esumi
SuperUser
Toshi_Esumi
SuperUser
February 13, 2026

Please share the link to the document you're referring to. With the context around it it's not clear what this process is for. 

 

Toshi

T
TTFNAuthor
New Member
February 13, 2026

Hi sure:

 

Creating firmware templates | FortiManager 7.6.6 | Fortinet Document Library

Markus_M
Staff & Editor
Markus_M
Staff & Editor
February 13, 2026

FortiGate has two boot sectors in which one carries the current firmware and the other carries the one before one upgrade (important to consider on upgrade paths as these are multiple upgrades).

You can arbitrarily switch the boot sectors and reboot FortiGate to it, if need be. Works the following:

https://community.fortinet.com/t5/FortiGate/Technical-Tip-Selecting-an-alternate-firmware-for-the-next/ta-p/191425

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