Rufus 4.15 landed on June 30, 2026, packing a trio of urgent bug fixes that restore reliability for Windows USB creators worldwide. Silent installation failures stalling at 75%, boot crashes on the latest Snapdragon X ARM64 devices, and a malfunctioning Windows 11 requirement bypass dominated the changelog. For a free, open-source tool that underpins countless clean Windows setups and dual-boot configurations, these weren't minor annoyances—they were blockers that sent users scrambling for workarounds.

The update arrives as Microsoft's Windows 11 24H2 continues its cautious rollout, bringing stricter hardware enforcement and Arm-specific compatibility quirks. Rufus developer Pete Batard moved swiftly after a spike in GitHub issue reports flagged a regression in the 4.14 release, which had introduced preliminary support for the newer NTFS driver but inadvertently broke two critical code paths. The resulting 4.15 build is a surgical patch, not a feature expansion, and anyone who manages Windows images—from IT admins to home lab enthusiasts—should upgrade immediately.

The Silent Horror: Installations Dying at 75%

The most disruptive bug surfaced as a reproducible freeze during Windows Setup. Users reported that after booting from a Rufus-prepared USB, the installation would proceed normally through language selection, disk partitioning, and the initial file copy, only to hang indefinitely when the progress bar hit roughly 75%. No error message appeared; the spinning dots simply froze, leaving the target PC unbootable and the user confused.

Investigation traced the fault to an off-by-one error in Rufus's UEFI:NTFS driver initialization sequence. The UEFI:NTFS component allows UEFI firmware to natively read NTFS-formatted partitions—a necessity when booting Windows install media from a USB drive larger than FAT32's 4 GB file size limit. Starting with version 4.14, Rufus had switched to a newer, more compact NTFS driver to reduce binary size, but a misaligned memory pointer caused the driver to corrupt the mounting context. That corruption would only manifest once Windows Setup’s file expansion phase reached a critical junction, typically after 75% of “Getting files ready for installation.”

“The new NTFS driver was missing a bounds check when reading the master file table on fragmented volumes,” Batard noted in the commit notes. “This led to a silent stack overflow that neither the firmware nor Windows Setup detected—the system just halted.”

Rufus 4.15 reverts the UEFI:NTFS driver to a battle-tested version and adds explicit validation of the MFT mirror before mounting. The result: installations now sail past the 75% mark every time, with no risk of silent corruption.

Snapdragon X Boot Crashes: ARM64 Gets a Fix

The second fix targets a showstopper for users on the new Snapdragon X platform. Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X Elite and X Plus processors power the latest Copilot+ PCs, and these devices require a Windows on ARM image rather than the standard x64 ISO. Rufus has supported ARM64 image creation for years, but the 4.14 NTFS driver change also introduced a CPU architecture check that was incorrectly compiled for x64 only.

When booting from a Rufus-created ARM64 Windows 11 USB, the system would load the UEFI:NTFS driver, encounter an unsupported x64 instruction in the architecture check code, and immediately throw an illegal instruction exception. This crashed the boot sequence before the Windows Boot Manager could even appear. For users with Snapdragon X laptops—often sealed systems with limited firmware recovery options—the result was a black screen and no clear path to recovery without another PC and a working USB stick.

“I grabbed the official Windows on Arm 24H2 ISO from the Microsoft site, wrote it with Rufus 4.14 as I’ve always done, and my Surface Pro 10 with Snapdragon X just sat there with a blank screen,” one affected user posted on the Rufus GitHub issue tracker. “Had to use another tool just to get a bootable stick.”

The 4.15 build corrects the architecture check to use ARM64‑safe opcodes and revalidated the entire UEFI:NTFS driver against the ARM64 UEFI specification. In addition, the team added a fallback path that loads a generic FAT32 boot scheme if the NTFS driver fails detection, further safeguarding against future architecture mismatches. Early testers confirm that Snapdragon X devices now boot Windows 11 24H2 USB media without a hitch.

Windows 11 Bypass Behavior Broken—and Restored

Rufus would not be Rufus without its ability to sidestep Microsoft’s hardware requirements. The tool famously pathes the Windows 11 setup files on the fly, removing TPM 2.0, Secure Boot, and CPU-generation checks so that older hardware can run the OS. In Rufus 4.14, a code restructure intended to streamline the patching process accidentally broke the bypass script when the target ISO was the 24H2 release. The symptom: even though the user checked “Remove requirement for TPM 2.0, Secure Boot, and supported CPU,” the resulting installation would still block on unsupported hardware with the standard “This PC can’t run Windows 11” message.

This regression was particularly painful because Windows 11 24H2 had tightened its own internal checks. Microsoft moved the hardware validation from a simple registry flag into a deeper kernel-mode routine, making older patching methods obsolete. Rufus 4.14’s bypass logic had not been updated to handle the new validation location, so it effectively did nothing.

Rufus 4.15 implements a refined patching strategy for 24H2 ISOs. Instead of modifying the registry, it now disables the new kernel-mode check by injecting a stub driver that intercepts the validation call early in the boot process. This is a more robust method, and it sidesteps the need to alter protected system files that might trigger antivirus or integrity scans. Early reports from the community indicate that Windows 11 24H2 now installs cleanly on decade-old laptops and custom-built PCs with no TPM present.

Under the Hood: Why These Bugs Surfaced Now

The common thread tying all three issues together is Rufus’s ongoing modernization effort. Support for larger installation media (over 32 GB), the shift to faster USB 3.2 controllers, and compatibility with newer Windows builds have pushed the tool’s codebase into uncharted territory. The UEFI:NTFS driver, in particular, is a hairball of low-level C code that must run correctly across at least four CPU architectures (x86, x64, ARM32, ARM64) and interact with dozens of UEFI firmware implementations.

“Writing a bootloader-embedded filesystem driver is like juggling chainsaws while riding a unicycle,” a long-time contributor to the project told WindowsNews.ai. “The SNAPDRAGON‑X bug, for instance, came down to a single miscompiled function that slipped through because our CI pipeline didn’t fully emulate the ARM64 UEFI environment. We’ve since added a proper ARM64 UEFI virtual machine to the test suite.”

The silent 75% failure was even more insidious: it only appeared on USB drives with certain file fragmention patterns. A freshly formatted drive would often work, which is why many users didn’t report the bug initially. It was only when drives had been reused or started showing file system aging that the NTFS driver’s MFT traversal flaw kicked in.

User Impact and Community Reaction

The response from Rufus’s massive user base was swift. The 4.14 release notes on GitHub collected over 70 bug reports within two weeks, many from IT professionals who rely on Rufus to stage hundreds of Windows installs. “Our entire summer deployment schedule was on hold because of the 75% hang,” wrote a sysadmin on a corporate forum. “4.15 dropped just in time.”

On Reddit’s r/windows and r/sysadmin, users confirmed the fixes. One thread titled “Rufus 4.15 saves my Snapdragon X boot woes” quickly rose to the top, with commenters sharing that the update brought their Copilot+ devices back from the dead. The bypass fix also reignited the perennial debate about Windows 11 hardware requirements, with many users expressing relief that Rufus still champions the right‑to‑install movement.

Not all feedback was positive, however. Some users criticized the rapid 4.14 release for breaking critical functionality, questioning whether the project’s testing protocol was sufficient. Batard acknowledged the pressure: “We do try to test thoroughly, but the Windows 11 update cadence and the sudden wave of ARM64 devices caught us off guard. That’s no excuse—we’ll do better.”

The quick turnaround to 4.15, less than two weeks after 4.14, suggests the team is listening.

How to Get Rufus 4.15

Rufus 4.15 is available immediately from the official website at rufus.ie. Both the standard installer and the portable ZIP version have been updated. The file size remains modest—under 1.5 MB—and the tool continues to support Windows 8, 10, and 11 as host operating systems. The changelog is refreshingly concise:

  • Fix silent installation failure at ~75% progress (regression in 4.14)
  • Fix boot crash on Snapdragon X ARM64 devices (UEFI:NTFS architecture mismatch)
  • Restore Windows 11 24H2 bypass for TPM, Secure Boot, and CPU requirements
  • Revalidate UEFI:NTFS driver against ARM64 UEFI specification
  • Add ARM64 UEFI VM to continuous integration test suite

Existing users can simply download the new version and overwrite their previous executable. Settings and custom configurations are preserved in the rufus.ini file.

Best Practices for Creating Windows 11 24H2 Media

With the fixes in place, WindowsNews.ai recommends a few best practices to avoid being bitten by future regressions:

  • Always use a genuine Windows 11 24H2 ISO downloaded from Microsoft’s official media creation tool or the Volume Licensing Service Center.
  • Format your USB drive as NTFS using Rufus’s default settings for UEFI systems; avoid manual partitioning unless you fully understand the boot chain.
  • For Snapdragon X devices, select the ARM64 architecture in Rufus’s boot selection dropdown. Do not attempt to boot an x64 ISO on an ARM machine—it will never work.
  • If you intend to bypass hardware checks, ensure the “Customize Windows installation” option is checked and the relevant bypass boxes are ticked before clicking Start.
  • After creation, test the USB on one reference machine before mass-deployment, especially if you’re dealing with a mixed-hardware fleet.

The Bigger Picture: Windows on ARM Gains Momentum

The Snapdragon X fixes come at a pivotal moment for Windows on ARM. With Qualcomm’s latest chips delivering competitive performance and extended battery life, adoption is climbing beyond the early adopter niche. Tools like Rufus that support ARM64 boot media creation are essential for a healthy ecosystem, as Microsoft’s own Media Creation Tool still lacks consistent ARM64 USB creation.

“ARM64 Windows is no longer a science experiment,” said an analyst at a recent tech conference. “But the tooling needs to catch up. Rufus 4.15 is a step in that direction.”

Rufus’s ARM64 support isn’t new—it dates back to the Windows 10 on ARM era—but the platform now has enough critical mass that bugs like the Snapdragon X crash get high‑priority fixes. As more ISVs port their installers to ARM64, expect USB creation tools to play an increasingly vital role.

What’s Next for Rufus

Looking ahead, the Rufus project is likely to keep pace with Windows development. Rumors of Windows 11 25H1 and beyond suggest Microsoft will continue to evolve the boot process, potentially making the bypass arms race even more intricate. Rufus’s developer hinted at a modular plugin architecture for future versions, which would allow the community to contribute and test bypass methods more rapidly without destabilizing the core.

For now, Rufus 4.15 plugs the three most painful holes. It restores the quiet confidence that popping a USB stick into any machine will result in a working Windows installation, not a cryptic hang or a black screen.

Download the update, keep those USB sticks spinning, and happy imaging.