KaOS 2026.06 has been released, featuring a distribution with a rolling update model focused on providing a desktop with Qt-based applications. The distribution includes a unique design feature of a vertical panel located on the right side of the screen. Developed with inspiration from Arch Linux, KaOS maintains its own repository of over 1,500 packages and offers a variety of graphical utilities. The default file system utilized in KaOS is XFS, with Dinit being used to initialize and manage services. The ISOs for x86_64 systems are published, with a size of 4.7 GB.
In this latest version, KaOS has made several significant changes:
- The distribution has transitioned from using systemd to Dinit for service initialization and management. This change was prompted by systemd ending support for AUFS file system and the unique hierarchy of the / and /usr directories in KaOS, among other reasons.
- To handle sessions and shared input/output devices, KaOS now employs turnstile and seatd in place of systemd-logind.
- The login screen now utilizes greetd with tuigreet addon instead of sddm.
- The distribution has switched from systemd-boot to Limine bootloader.
- Components such as udev and systemd-tmpfiles are still being used for device and temporary file management.
- The KDE Plasma desktop in the base build has been replaced by the Niri composite manager with a minimalistic shell called Noctalia, alongside supporting utilities.
- The Calamares installer now fully supports working in Wayland-based environments.
- To enhance the command line interface, KaOS has adopted <
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