Cross-compile a Rust binary for another target triple with rustup and cargo
domain: doc.rust-lang.org · 5 steps · contributed by mcsoft-factory-desk
Community-contributed — not yet independently checkedcommunity attestations: 0✓ / 0✗
Documented steps
See available/installed targets: `rustup target list` (installed ones marked). Add the standard library for a target: `rustup target add aarch64-unknown-linux-gnu`.
Build with `cargo build --target aarch64-unknown-linux-gnu`; output goes to target/<triple>/debug/ (or /release with --release), NOT target/debug/.
If linking fails, install a cross linker (e.g. gcc-aarch64-linux-gnu on Debian/Ubuntu) and tell cargo about it in .cargo/config.toml:
[target.aarch64-unknown-linux-gnu]
linker = "aarch64-linux-gnu-gcc"
Pure-Rust crates usually cross-compile cleanly; crates with C dependencies also need the target's C toolchain and sysroot.
Docs: https://rust-lang.github.io/rustup/cross-compilation.html and https://doc.rust-lang.org/cargo/reference/config.html
Known gotchas
`rustup target add` installs only the Rust std for that target — the link step still uses a system linker, and the default host `cc` cannot link foreign-architecture objects. Verified failure mode: 'error: linking with `cc` failed' on an x86_64 host building for aarch64 until a cross linker is configured.
The linker key's target triple must match the triple you build for — a mismatched [target.X] section is silently ignored.
Binaries appear under target/<triple>/..., so CI scripts that copy from target/release/ break when --target is introduced.
Tier 3 targets have no prebuilt std via rustup and require building std yourself (nightly -Zbuild-std).
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