AnduinOS, a one-man challenge from a Chinese language Microsoft engineer, is kind of a brand new Ubuntu remix that reshapes GNOME within the picture of Home windows 11.
Thus far, AnduinOS is barely on its fourth launch. The present launch, version 1.3, relies on Ubuntu 25.04 and appeared initially of this month.
Though it’s not technologically radical, there are a number of uncommon points to AnduinOS that make it attention-grabbing. In contrast to many remixes, it does not substitute Ubuntu’s default desktop. As a substitute, it modifies Canonical’s present model of GNOME to look strikingly like Home windows 11, utilizing a group of present extensions and themes. It has good localization, with separate regional variations and full Chinese language language help. It is because it is a one-man challenge by a Chinese language developer, Anduin Xue, whose day job is at Microsoft.
We’re not wild concerning the Home windows 11-style begin button, however it works – click on to enlarge
The AnduinOS desktop strongly resembles Home windows 11, so it might present a tender touchdown for customers who’re conversant in the most recent model of desktop Home windows, however maybe need to attempt Linux on an older PC that may’t run the most recent launch. It does this utilizing a customized theme that appears very like this KDE 6 one, proper right down to the wallpaper and a group of 18 totally different GNOME extensions. (This would possibly trigger issues with OS upgrades in future: GNOME extensions are recognized for being inclined to interrupt with new variations of the desktop, however the GNOME challenge is working on this.)
To realize its Win11-style appears to be like, AnduinOS bundles a whole lot of GNOME extensions – click on to enlarge
Zorin OS does similar, however it does not use upstream variations of extensions – though the corporate does sponsor their development. The paid model of Zorin OS additionally provides in a lot of further FOSS apps. AnduinOS does not. In truth, it has fewer parts than Ubuntu itself, making it barely lighter-weight. One other win on account of sticking with vanilla GNOME is that AnduinOS works effectively utilizing each X.org and Wayland, in contrast to Linux Mint’s Cinnamon, a GNOME fork whose Wayland support is still experimental.
AnduinOS has extra than simply beauty modifications, although. It removes Canonical’s controversial Snap packaging format and its supporting instruments. It replaces it with Flatpak and the GNOME Software program app retailer configured to point out solely Flatpak apps. AnduinOS makes use of native .deb packages all through, together with for Mozilla Firefox; it comes with no Flatpaks put in in any respect. The plan is that every one further apps you add can be Flatpaks. This may take extra disk area, however it means you will get newer variations, and updating needs to be simpler.
You’ll most likely want some further apps. There is not any workplace suite, no e-mail consumer, no messaging consumer, and so forth. Ever since Ubuntu 23.10, what was beforehand referred to as the “minimal set up” has been the default, and also you get an identical set of apps right here. They’re principally GNOME equipment, equivalent to picture and doc viewers, media gamers, an enhanced calculator, a BitTorrent consumer, and so forth. Nonetheless, if the pc is generally for net entry, this can be all you want.
As we have lined lately, the “End of 10” is nigh, resulting in high levels of interest in Windows-replacement distros. The creator of AnduinOS has written about his surprise concerning the ranges of consideration his little facet challenge has attracted of late.
We aren’t stunned, although. For a modest challenge by a single developer, it is an excellent instance. One other spotlight is that it has good documentation, which is very uncommon for a passion challenge. As an illustration, it has a transparent version history, so whereas the present model 1.3 relies on an interim Ubuntu launch, and so will not get updates after subsequent January, there are LTS variations: AnduinOS 1.0 was primarily based on Ubuntu “Jammy” and 1.1 on “Noble,” the present LTS. The future roadmap is that model 1.5 can be an LTS, primarily based on Ubuntu 26.04.
AnduinOS 1.3 is barely a 2 GB obtain, whereas the total GNOME model of Ubuntu is a whopping six and 1 / 4 gigabytes. Even the minimal version of Xubuntu 25.04 is three gigs. Though GNOME just isn’t a light-weight desktop, as we talked about looking at the Fedora 42 beta, GNOME 48 has been tuned to carry out higher on low-end {hardware}. The default AnduinOS set up took 6.9 GB of disk area (together with a 2 GB swap file) and 1.3 GB of RAM at idle. That is not dangerous for a 2025 Linux.
The Reg FOSS desk favors the precept of “much less is extra,” and whereas GNOME nonetheless is not our most popular desktop, AnduinOS makes it look pretty much as good because it will get. We really feel that the builders of a few of the higher-profile Ubuntu-based distros might study by paying shut consideration to this. ®
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We will not assist however surprise if challenge creator Anduin Xue’s mother and father are Tolkien followers. Anduin is the name of a river in Center Earth.
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