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Downgrading Flex Software

Downgrading Flex software should only be done at the direction of Opentrons Support for troubleshooting or software compliance purposes. The instructions in this section take you through the robot software downgrade process.

Previous versions of the Flex operating system (and App software) are available on Github at https://github.com/Opentrons/opentrons/releases.

Tip

Make sure your Flex is idle before downgrading. Some required App features are not available while the robot is running a protocol.

Part 1: Downloading an earlier software version

  1. On the Github releases page, find an earlier version of the Flex software you want to use. We recommend only rolling back to the version closest to the latest release.

  2. In the Assets section of a release, click the small triangle (▸) to expand a list of compressed software files available for download.

    Image showing expanded section with software versions

  3. Click the compressed file named ot3-system-<version number>.zip to download and save it to your computer. For example, to get Flex software version 8.7, you'd click the file ot3-system-8.7.0.zip. In the file name, ot3 refers to Flex.

Part 2: Installing the earlier version

  1. From the Devices tab in the App, find the robot you want to work with.

  2. Click the three-dot menu (⋮) and then click Robot Settings.

  3. Click the Advanced tab.

  4. In the Advanced settings, find the section labelled "Update robot software manually with a local file."

    Update software settings under the Advanced tab

  5. Click Browse file system and navigate to the location where you saved the previously downloaded version of the Flex software.

  6. Select the downloaded .zip file that contains the Flex software and then click Open. This starts the automatic software installation process, which can take about 15 minutes to complete.

Part 3: After downgrading

The App will notify you when the downgrade installation is complete. You should also check the touchscreen on your Flex before using it. The touchscreen might show the robot going through additional firmware checks and updates that are not reflected in the App. Flex will restart after these firmware checks finish. After restarting, your Flex will be running on an earlier version of the robot operating system.