Start a new device

This page takes you from an empty account to a device you can update. It covers four steps: get an image, flash it, put the device in your account, then pick how you will manage it. For the different ways a device can join your account, see How onboarding works.

1. Download an image

Pick your board and download a Pantavisor image from Download image in the Hub (/download-image). You can also build your own image: see Building device images.

2. Flash and boot

Write the image to your device's storage and power it on. How you flash it depends on the board:

• Most boards boot from an SD card: write the .wic image with a tool such as Raspberry Pi Imager, balenaEtcher or dd. See Flashing via SD card.
• Other boards flash their on-board storage over USB. See Flashing images in the Pantavisor docs for the method your board needs.

For a full walkthrough on a Raspberry Pi, see Download and flash image.

The device needs network access to reach the Hub. A device with no Ethernet can get your Wi-Fi details from Provision Wi-Fi in the Hub (/provision-wifi).

3. Put the device in your account

On first boot the device registers with the Hub. Then:

• An image downloaded from the Hub joins your account on its own and appears in your Devices list.
• Any other image registers unclaimed. Claim it with its ID and challenge (pvr device scan on the same network shows both).

4. Choose how you will manage it

Once the device is in your account, every change is a new revision the device downloads and installs. You can make those changes three ways, and you can mix them:

Way	Best for	Guide
The Hub web app	Looking at status and logs, editing configuration, rolling back	Devices, Deploying updates
pvr CLI	Cloning the device's state, adding apps, scripting and CI	Updating with pvr
An AI assistant	Asking in plain words: build an app, deploy it, find out why an update failed	The MCP connector, Building with an AI assistant

To build and deploy your own app, start with Builds.

Automating provisioning

To provision devices without manual steps, create an auto-join token and put it in your image or provisioning flow. See Auto-join tokens.

For factory flows where the token could leak, add a second check: enable owner verification on the token so devices must also prove they hold a private key over mutual TLS. See TLS onboarding.