diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 04fa531f..d520e88e 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -111,6 +111,22 @@ This command will:
 - **Create a custom ISO with the cloud config attached to drive automated installations**
 - **Provision Kairos from network, with the same settings**
 
+### Specifying architecture
+
+When pulling container images for a different architecture than the host (e.g., pulling ARM64 images on an AMD64 host), you need to specify the `arch` option:
+
+```
+docker run --rm -ti --net host quay.io/kairos/auroraboot \
+  --set container_image=quay.io/kairos/alpine:3.21-standard-arm64-rpi4-v3.6.0-rc5-k3s-v1.32.9-k3s1 \
+  --set arch=arm64
+```
+
+Supported architectures:
+- `amd64` (default, matches x86_64)
+- `arm64` (matches aarch64)
+
+**Note**: If you don't specify `arch` when pulling images for a different architecture, AuroraBoot will default to the host architecture (`amd64` on x86_64 systems), which will fail when the image doesn't have a matching platform variant.
+
 ### Disable Netboot
 
 To disable netboot, and allow only ISO generation (for offline usage), use `--set disable_netboot=true`:
@@ -129,6 +145,7 @@ A configuration file can be for instance:
 artifact_version: "v2.4.2"
 release_version: "v2.4.2"
 container_image: "..."
+arch: "amd64"  # Optional: architecture to use when pulling container images (amd64 or arm64)
 flavor: "rockylinux"
 flavor_release: "9"
 repository: "kairos-io/kairos"
diff --git a/deployer/steps.go b/deployer/steps.go
index e6111f4a..1a40b0bf 100644
--- a/deployer/steps.go
+++ b/deployer/steps.go
@@ -95,9 +95,10 @@ func (d *Deployer) StepCopyCloudConfig() error {
 
 func (d *Deployer) StepDumpSource() error {
 	// Ops to generate from container image
+	internal.Log.Logger.Debug().Str("arch", d.Config.Arch).Str("image", d.Artifact.ContainerImage).Msg("StepDumpSource: config arch and image")
 	return d.Add(constants.OpDumpSource,
 		herd.EnableIf(d.fromImage),
-		herd.WithDeps(constants.OpPrepareDirs), herd.WithCallback(ops.DumpSource(d.Artifact.ContainerImage, d.tmpRootFs)))
+		herd.WithDeps(constants.OpPrepareDirs), herd.WithCallback(ops.DumpSource(d.Artifact.ContainerImage, d.tmpRootFs, d.Config.Arch)))
 }
 
 func (d *Deployer) StepGenISO() error {
diff --git a/example.yaml b/example.yaml
index d796a819..ad2e8da1 100644
--- a/example.yaml
+++ b/example.yaml
@@ -1,5 +1,7 @@
 artifact_version: "v2.4.2"
 release_version: "v2.4.2"
+container_image: ""  # Optional: container image to use instead of artifacts
+arch: "amd64"  # Optional: architecture to use when pulling container images (amd64 or arm64)
 flavor: "rockylinux"
 flavor_release: "9"
 repository: "kairos-io/kairos"
diff --git a/internal/cmd/build-uki.go b/internal/cmd/build-uki.go
index 70c5bf6a..1323583c 100644
--- a/internal/cmd/build-uki.go
+++ b/internal/cmd/build-uki.go
@@ -288,6 +288,9 @@ var BuildUKICmd = cli.Command{
 
 		e := elemental.NewElemental(config)
 		_, err = e.DumpSource(sourceDir, imgSource)
+		if err != nil {
+			return fmt.Errorf("extracting image source: %w", err)
+		}
 		defer os.RemoveAll(sourceDir)
 
 		if overlayRootfs := ctx.String("overlay-rootfs"); overlayRootfs != "" {
@@ -550,13 +553,46 @@ func getEfiNeededFiles(arch string) ([]string, error) {
 }
 
 func findKairosVersion(sourceDir string) (string, error) {
+	// Check if sourceDir exists
+	if _, err := os.Stat(sourceDir); err != nil {
+		return "", fmt.Errorf("source directory does not exist: %s: %w", sourceDir, err)
+	}
+
 	var osReleaseBytes []byte
-	osReleaseBytes, err := os.ReadFile(filepath.Join(sourceDir, "etc", "kairos-release"))
+	var err error
+
+	// Try kairos-release first
+	kairosReleasePath := filepath.Join(sourceDir, "etc", "kairos-release")
+	osReleaseBytes, err = os.ReadFile(kairosReleasePath)
 	if err != nil {
 		// fallback to os-release
-		osReleaseBytes, err = os.ReadFile(filepath.Join(sourceDir, "etc", "os-release"))
+		osReleasePath := filepath.Join(sourceDir, "etc", "os-release")
+		osReleaseBytes, err = os.ReadFile(osReleasePath)
 		if err != nil {
-			return "", fmt.Errorf("reading kairos-release file: %w", err)
+			// Check if etc directory exists and list its contents for debugging
+			etcDir := filepath.Join(sourceDir, "etc")
+			if etcInfo, err := os.Stat(etcDir); err == nil && etcInfo.IsDir() {
+				entries, listErr := os.ReadDir(etcDir)
+				if listErr == nil {
+					var files []string
+					for _, entry := range entries {
+						files = append(files, entry.Name())
+					}
+					return "", fmt.Errorf("reading kairos-release or os-release file: %w (found files in etc/: %v)", err, files)
+				}
+			}
+			// If etc doesn't exist, list top-level directory contents
+			entries, listErr := os.ReadDir(sourceDir)
+			if listErr == nil {
+				var dirs []string
+				for _, entry := range entries {
+					if entry.IsDir() {
+						dirs = append(dirs, entry.Name())
+					}
+				}
+				return "", fmt.Errorf("reading kairos-release or os-release file: %w (top-level directories found: %v)", err, dirs)
+			}
+			return "", fmt.Errorf("reading kairos-release or os-release file: %w", err)
 		}
 	}
 
diff --git a/pkg/ops/container.go b/pkg/ops/container.go
index e56cc29e..130ef83b 100644
--- a/pkg/ops/container.go
+++ b/pkg/ops/container.go
@@ -13,16 +13,29 @@ import (
 // or simply copies the directory to the destination.
 // Supports these prefixes:
 // https://github.com/kairos-io/kairos-agent/blob/1e81cdef38677c8a36cae50d3334559976f66481/pkg/types/v1/common.go#L30-L33
-func DumpSource(image string, dstFunc valueGetOnCall) func(ctx context.Context) error {
+func DumpSource(image string, dstFunc valueGetOnCall, arch string) func(ctx context.Context) error {
 	return func(ctx context.Context) error {
 		dst := dstFunc()
 		if image == "" {
 			return fmt.Errorf("image source is empty, cannot dump to %s", dst)
 		}
-		cfg := NewConfig(
+		internal.Log.Logger.Debug().Str("arch", arch).Msg("DumpSource: arch parameter")
+		opts := []GenericOptions{
 			WithImageExtractor(v1.OCIImageExtractor{}),
 			WithLogger(internal.Log),
-		)
+		}
+		if arch != "" {
+			opts = append(opts, WithArch(arch))
+		}
+		cfg := NewConfig(opts...)
+		if cfg != nil {
+			internal.Log.Logger.Debug().Str("arch", cfg.Arch).Msg("DumpSource: config arch after NewConfig")
+			if cfg.Platform != nil {
+				internal.Log.Logger.Debug().Str("platform", cfg.Platform.String()).Msg("DumpSource: config platform after NewConfig")
+			} else {
+				internal.Log.Logger.Debug().Msg("DumpSource: config platform is nil after NewConfig")
+			}
+		}
 		e := elemental.NewElemental(cfg)
 
 		imgSource, err := v1.NewSrcFromURI(image)
diff --git a/pkg/ops/iso.go b/pkg/ops/iso.go
index da2a3c4c..9447a330 100644
--- a/pkg/ops/iso.go
+++ b/pkg/ops/iso.go
@@ -756,3 +756,22 @@ func WithImageExtractor(extractor v1types.ImageExtractor) func(r *agentconfig.Co
 		return nil
 	}
 }
+
+func WithArch(arch string) func(r *agentconfig.Config) error {
+	return func(r *agentconfig.Config) error {
+		if arch != "" {
+			convertedArch, err := utils.GolangArchToArch(arch)
+			if err != nil {
+				return fmt.Errorf("invalid architecture %s: %w", arch, err)
+			}
+			r.Arch = convertedArch
+			// Also set Platform since DumpSource uses Platform.String() not Arch
+			platform, err := v1types.NewPlatformFromArch(arch)
+			if err != nil {
+				return fmt.Errorf("invalid architecture for platform %s: %w", arch, err)
+			}
+			r.Platform = platform
+		}
+		return nil
+	}
+}
diff --git a/pkg/schema/config.go b/pkg/schema/config.go
index abc398ba..14c22e29 100644
--- a/pkg/schema/config.go
+++ b/pkg/schema/config.go
@@ -27,6 +27,9 @@ type Config struct {
 
 	ListenAddr string `yaml:"listen_addr"`
 
+	// Architecture to use for container image pulling (e.g., "amd64", "arm64")
+	Arch string `yaml:"arch"`
+
 	// ISO block configuration
 	ISO ISO `yaml:"iso"`