{"slug": "wayland", "name": "Wayland", "category": "other", "category_name": "Other software", "description": "Display server protocol for Linux desktops, intended to replace the X11 window system.", "recommenders": 14, "commenters": 39, "warners": 21, "score": -5.209, "rising": -0.93, "first": "2025-11-20", "latest": "2026-08-29", "why": "Liked for tear-free, smoother rendering and better multi-monitor and fractional scaling support, with several long-time users finding it more stable than X11.", "why_is_quote": false, "has_verdict": true, "sentiment": {"recommend": 15, "neutral": 2, "compare": 2, "warn": 22}, "spark": [0, 0, 6, 0, 6, 0, 0, 0, 0, 3, 0, 0], "listed": true, "loved": ["Stability", "Multi-monitor scaling"], "caveat": "Breaks workflows", "short_quote": "As a 25 year user of Linux I love wayland since cutting over to it about 5 years ago. No tearing ever", "icon": true, "domain": "freedesktop.org", "github_repo": null, "official_url": "https://wayland.freedesktop.org/", "pricing": "open source", "aliases": ["Wayland"], "verdict": [{"text": "Liked for tear-free, smoother rendering", "cites": [{"id": 758337904, "item_id": 47396119, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47396119", "by": "throwthro0954", "date": "2026-03-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "As a 25 year user of Linux I love wayland since cutting over to it about 5 years ago. No tearing ever", "excerpt": "As a 25 year user of Linux I love wayland since cutting over to it about 5 years ago. No tearing ever, which I always had to battle with with X. Certain developers that must interact with the Wayland stack will have to do more work now, and some projects may not still be viable, I get it. I've been following the comments in Linux forums for years. But users exist too, and here is one data point for you.", "context": "25 year Linux user", "use_case": "Linux desktop display", "switched_from": "X", "story": "Separating the Wayland Compositor and Window Manager"}, {"id": 743786192, "item_id": 46486637, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46486637", "by": "edent", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've been running Wayland on a Framework laptop and it just works.", "excerpt": "I've been running Wayland on a Framework laptop and it just works. Droves my 4K external monitor, quickly switches to single screen, does fractional scaling well, runs all my apps without complaint. I had an old Chromebook which had Lubuntu on it - screen tearing was driving me crazy so I switched to Wayland and it is buttery smooth. No mean feat given the decrepit hardware. I'm sure someone will be along to tell me ", "context": "Framework laptop user", "use_case": "desktop display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}, {"id": 759218097, "item_id": 47451131, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47451131", "by": "kombine", "date": "2026-03-19", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I switched to Wayland to years ago when Plasma 6 was released and all the glitches were gone.", "excerpt": "I've been running Plasma Desktop for years and had to put up with graphical glitches in its X11 iteration. I switched to Wayland to years ago when Plasma 6 was released and all the glitches were gone. Additionally, overall snappiness and responsiveness of the desktop and window management improved markedly, I felt like a got a new computer. Granted, I had to acquire an AMD GPU for this transition but it was well wort", "context": "", "use_case": "desktop display", "switched_from": "X11", "story": "Wayland set the Linux Desktop back by 10 years"}]}, {"text": " and better multi-monitor and fractional scaling support", "cites": [{"id": 791809568, "item_id": 49488098, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49488098", "by": "ezst", "date": "2026-08-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it addressed some decades-long struggles around multi monitor and DPI layouts", "excerpt": "Matter of fact, the vast majority has moved on to Wayland years ago, both KDE and Gnome have reported their usage stats and neither sees a point in keeping X11 afloat. I too have been using Wayland (KDE) for years, it addressed some decades-long struggles around multi monitor and DPI layouts. I use input methods for CJK that work better and more consistently than before. As far as I'm concerned, this ship has sailed,", "context": "KDE user for years", "use_case": "desktop on KDE", "switched_from": "X11", "story": "Kumander Linux \u2013 A Linux Distro with a Windows 7 Desktop"}, {"id": 743786976, "item_id": 46486686, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46486686", "by": "fabian2k", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Wayland fixes that, so that part is a huge improvement to me.", "excerpt": "I just recently switched to Linux since I had some weird Windows issues I couldn't fix. I've tried to switch a few times before, but the main problem at some point was that I didn't have proper fractional scaling on Linux. And that alone pretty much made Linux unusable for me on my specific hardware. Wayland fixes that, so that part is a huge improvement to me. Unfortunately this also limited my choice of Distros as ", "context": "recent Windows-to-Linux switcher", "use_case": "fractional scaling", "switched_from": "", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}, {"id": 759289872, "item_id": 47455617, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47455617", "by": "Buxato", "date": "2026-03-20", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I began using Wayland since this last Kubuntu 25.10", "excerpt": "It seems more that the cat with tinfoil is him. I have been using Linux partially since 1994 and exclusively since 2010 (aprox), never more things were so \"just work\" and smooth for me like right now. I began using Wayland since this last Kubuntu 25.10, because before even if some things were better I have few problems with my work software, now suspend its perfect, desktop grid with videogames is perfect, multi moni", "context": "Linux user since 1994", "use_case": "desktop display", "switched_from": "", "story": "Wayland set the Linux Desktop back by 10 years"}]}, {"text": ", with several long-time users finding it more stable than X11.", "cites": [{"id": 791802400, "item_id": 49487650, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49487650", "by": "kombine", "date": "2026-08-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've been using Wayland for two and a half years and it's been more stable than X11", "excerpt": "> wayland is not cross platform nor stable. I've been using Wayland for two and a half years and it's been more stable than X11 that I've been using prior for years.", "context": "", "use_case": "desktop display server", "switched_from": "X11", "story": "Kumander Linux \u2013 A Linux Distro with a Windows 7 Desktop"}, {"id": 743791201, "item_id": 46486950, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46486950", "by": "zeta0134", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "crashes regularly under X11 nearly every time I open a new window, but is perfectly stable under wayland", "excerpt": "KDE Plasma switched to Wayland by default sometime last year, and so far the main issue I run into is that a few screen recording tools I like stopped working. (Mostly simplescreenrecorder, which seems to be entirely unmaintained at this point.) Other than some initial instability with accelerated rendering on my GPU, which was quickly addressed, it kinda just works. I mostly don't notice. Actually, GPU acceleration ", "context": "", "use_case": "desktop display server", "switched_from": "X11", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}, {"id": 743790784, "item_id": 46486924, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46486924", "by": "joelthelion", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've been using wayland with Gnome for years without a single issue.", "excerpt": "I've been using wayland with Gnome for years without a single issue. Arguably my hardware is a lot simpler and I don't use Nvidia. But I just want to point out that, for all the flak wayland receives, it can work quite well.", "context": "simple non-Nvidia hardware", "use_case": "desktop display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}]}, {"text": " The most common complaint is that it breaks X11-era tools, scripts and workflows", "cites": [{"id": 790070929, "item_id": 49379433, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49379433", "by": "mmh0000", "date": "2026-08-20", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Because it breaks everything.", "excerpt": "That's a new take: Project with new release 1 day ago declared deprecated! I've been using Linux for around 2 decades. I am currently running Fedora 43/KDE Plasma ... and wait for it ... Xorg. Why? Because it works. It works well! Why don't I use Wayland? Because it breaks everything. - Screensharing is just wonky and inconsistent across applications. It has gotten better in the last 2 years, but it's still quite won", "context": "Linux user for around 2 decades", "use_case": "display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Xorg-Server 26.0.99.901"}, {"id": 736025953, "item_id": 46001622, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46001622", "by": "ziotom78", "date": "2025-11-20", "stance": "warn", "quote": "the available solutions were fragile and complicated and took me so long before figuring solutions that only worked partially", "excerpt": "Xdotool and Xmodmap are the two main reasons why, after a few months running Wayland+keyd+dotool I went back to X11. I found really hard to have the following things working at once: - Italian layout for my keyboard with heavily-customized AltGr keys for mathematical notation (in X11 it's just a matter of having a Xmodmap file) - Using Espanso for many common shortcuts like :date: (current YYYY-MM-DD date) and :pidig", "context": "", "use_case": "desktop display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Exploring the Fragmentation of Wayland, an xdotool adventure"}, {"id": 743797392, "item_id": 46487337, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46487337", "by": "Joeboy", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "warn", "quote": "the switch to Wayland has wasted a lot of my time and has no visible benefits", "excerpt": "I recently upgraded to Ubuntu 25.10, and decided to give Wayland another go since X.org isn't installed by default anymore. Good news: My laptop (Lenovo P53) can now suspend / resume successfully. With Ubuntu 25.04 / Wayland it wouldn't resume successfully, which was a deal breaker. Annoying thing: I had a script that I used to organize workspaces using wmctrl, which doesn't work anymore so I had to write a gnome-she", "context": "Ubuntu user", "use_case": "desktop display server", "switched_from": "X.org", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}, {"id": 791824337, "item_id": 49489021, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49489021", "by": "jck86", "date": "2026-08-29", "stance": "warn", "quote": "won't consider running a wayland only DE at all for the forseable future since it breaks too many things", "excerpt": "Apparently you only want wayland based DEs and considered the argument to be over for everyone. How wrong were you. Lot's of people don't want to use wayland until it reaches a certain feature-complete maturity. I for instance have again put it off for another year and won't consider running a wayland only DE at all for the forseable future since it breaks too many things for no good reason and I need to be able to s", "context": "uses PC for work", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Kumander Linux \u2013 A Linux Distro with a Windows 7 Desktop"}, {"id": 736955376, "item_id": 46059711, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46059711", "by": "OhMeadhbh", "date": "2025-11-26", "stance": "warn", "quote": "doesn't work under Wayland", "excerpt": "Half of the software I use on a daily basis (lots of old SunOS-era custom data reduction software) doesn't work under Wayland. Guess I'll finally flip my daily driver over to *BSD.", "context": "uses old SunOS-era custom data reduction software", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "KDE Plasma 6.8 Will Go Wayland-Exclusive in Dropping X11 Session Support"}]}, {"text": ", with extra trouble reported on Nvidia GPUs.", "cites": [{"id": 759206416, "item_id": 47450401, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47450401", "by": "kelipso", "date": "2026-03-19", "stance": "warn", "quote": "everyone to encounter some kind of\nbug every time they do anything slightly off the beaten path", "excerpt": "X11 worked fine. Then Wayland came from somebody\u2019s fever dream and forced everyone to use it, just for everyone to encounter some kind of bug every time they do anything slightly off the beaten path. For me literally every new install is some stupid Wayland BS I have to deal with, probably because I use Nvidia drivers, but X11 worked perfectly fine. Wayland should have stayed in the playground as the post says.", "context": "Nvidia driver user", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Wayland set the Linux Desktop back by 10 years"}, {"id": 743844720, "item_id": 46490295, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46490295", "by": "nickjj", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I don't think Wayland is fully ready, at least not with NVIDIA GPUs with limited GPU memory.", "excerpt": "I don't think Wayland is fully ready, at least not with NVIDIA GPUs with limited GPU memory. I have a 7,000 word blog post and demo videos coming out this Tuesday with the details but I think I uncovered a driver bug having switched to native Linux a week ago with a low GPU memory card (750 Ti). Basically on Wayland, apps that request GPU memory will typically crash if there's no more GPU memory to allocate where as ", "context": "Recently switched to native Linux with a 750 Ti", "use_case": "display server on NVIDIA GPU", "switched_from": "", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}]}], "praise": [{"label": "Stability", "summary": "Several users switching from X11 report fewer crashes and steadier day-to-day use.", "quotes": [{"id": 791802400, "item_id": 49487650, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49487650", "by": "kombine", "date": "2026-08-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've been using Wayland for two and a half years and it's been more stable than X11", "excerpt": "> wayland is not cross platform nor stable. I've been using Wayland for two and a half years and it's been more stable than X11 that I've been using prior for years.", "context": "", "use_case": "desktop display server", "switched_from": "X11", "story": "Kumander Linux \u2013 A Linux Distro with a Windows 7 Desktop"}, {"id": 743791201, "item_id": 46486950, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46486950", "by": "zeta0134", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "crashes regularly under X11 nearly every time I open a new window, but is perfectly stable under wayland", "excerpt": "KDE Plasma switched to Wayland by default sometime last year, and so far the main issue I run into is that a few screen recording tools I like stopped working. (Mostly simplescreenrecorder, which seems to be entirely unmaintained at this point.) Other than some initial instability with accelerated rendering on my GPU, which was quickly addressed, it kinda just works. I mostly don't notice. Actually, GPU acceleration ", "context": "", "use_case": "desktop display server", "switched_from": "X11", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}, {"id": 743790784, "item_id": 46486924, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46486924", "by": "joelthelion", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've been using wayland with Gnome for years without a single issue.", "excerpt": "I've been using wayland with Gnome for years without a single issue. Arguably my hardware is a lot simpler and I don't use Nvidia. But I just want to point out that, for all the flak wayland receives, it can work quite well.", "context": "simple non-Nvidia hardware", "use_case": "desktop display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}]}, {"label": "Multi-monitor scaling", "summary": "Users say it fixes long-standing multi-monitor, DPI and fractional scaling problems.", "quotes": [{"id": 791809568, "item_id": 49488098, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49488098", "by": "ezst", "date": "2026-08-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it addressed some decades-long struggles around multi monitor and DPI layouts", "excerpt": "Matter of fact, the vast majority has moved on to Wayland years ago, both KDE and Gnome have reported their usage stats and neither sees a point in keeping X11 afloat. I too have been using Wayland (KDE) for years, it addressed some decades-long struggles around multi monitor and DPI layouts. I use input methods for CJK that work better and more consistently than before. As far as I'm concerned, this ship has sailed,", "context": "KDE user for years", "use_case": "desktop on KDE", "switched_from": "X11", "story": "Kumander Linux \u2013 A Linux Distro with a Windows 7 Desktop"}, {"id": 743786976, "item_id": 46486686, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46486686", "by": "fabian2k", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Wayland fixes that, so that part is a huge improvement to me.", "excerpt": "I just recently switched to Linux since I had some weird Windows issues I couldn't fix. I've tried to switch a few times before, but the main problem at some point was that I didn't have proper fractional scaling on Linux. And that alone pretty much made Linux unusable for me on my specific hardware. Wayland fixes that, so that part is a huge improvement to me. Unfortunately this also limited my choice of Distros as ", "context": "recent Windows-to-Linux switcher", "use_case": "fractional scaling", "switched_from": "", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}, {"id": 743786192, "item_id": 46486637, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46486637", "by": "edent", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've been running Wayland on a Framework laptop and it just works.", "excerpt": "I've been running Wayland on a Framework laptop and it just works. Droves my 4K external monitor, quickly switches to single screen, does fractional scaling well, runs all my apps without complaint. I had an old Chromebook which had Lubuntu on it - screen tearing was driving me crazy so I switched to Wayland and it is buttery smooth. No mean feat given the decrepit hardware. I'm sure someone will be along to tell me ", "context": "Framework laptop user", "use_case": "desktop display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}]}, {"label": "Just works", "summary": "Some daily users say their apps, screen sharing and hardware work without issues.", "quotes": [{"id": 743806464, "item_id": 46487904, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46487904", "by": "whalesalad", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Literally everything \u201cjust works\u201d and has been a joy to use.", "excerpt": "I\u2019ve been using Wayland on Debian 12 since 2023. On an Apple Studio Display (5K) over thunderbolt (the built-in camera, speakers, etc work fine) I screen share and video call with Slack and Google Meet. I use alacritty/zsh/tmux as my terminal. I use chromium as my browser, vscode and sublime text as code editors. Slack, Spotify, my studio mic, my Scarlett 2i2, 10gbe networking, thunderbolt, Logitech unifying receiver", "context": "Debian 12 user since 2023", "use_case": "daily desktop on Debian", "switched_from": "", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}, {"id": 759234673, "item_id": 47452167, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47452167", "by": "a2128", "date": "2026-03-20", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use Wayland exclusively everyday", "excerpt": "OBS can't screen record (it segfaults instead), I can't copy-paste, and I can't see window previews unless everything implements a specific extension to the core protocol. I can't take articles like this seriously when they so confidently make such statements that so directly conflict with reality. I use Wayland exclusively everyday and I screen record with OBS on both KDE and GNOME on multiple machines with no issue", "context": "", "use_case": "desktop display", "switched_from": "", "story": "Wayland set the Linux Desktop back by 10 years"}, {"id": 759289872, "item_id": 47455617, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47455617", "by": "Buxato", "date": "2026-03-20", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I began using Wayland since this last Kubuntu 25.10", "excerpt": "It seems more that the cat with tinfoil is him. I have been using Linux partially since 1994 and exclusively since 2010 (aprox), never more things were so \"just work\" and smooth for me like right now. I began using Wayland since this last Kubuntu 25.10, because before even if some things were better I have few problems with my work software, now suspend its perfect, desktop grid with videogames is perfect, multi moni", "context": "Linux user since 1994", "use_case": "desktop display", "switched_from": "", "story": "Wayland set the Linux Desktop back by 10 years"}]}, {"label": "Smooth rendering", "summary": "Users report no screen tearing and a snappier, glitch-free desktop.", "quotes": [{"id": 758337904, "item_id": 47396119, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47396119", "by": "throwthro0954", "date": "2026-03-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "As a 25 year user of Linux I love wayland since cutting over to it about 5 years ago. No tearing ever", "excerpt": "As a 25 year user of Linux I love wayland since cutting over to it about 5 years ago. No tearing ever, which I always had to battle with with X. Certain developers that must interact with the Wayland stack will have to do more work now, and some projects may not still be viable, I get it. I've been following the comments in Linux forums for years. But users exist too, and here is one data point for you.", "context": "25 year Linux user", "use_case": "Linux desktop display", "switched_from": "X", "story": "Separating the Wayland Compositor and Window Manager"}, {"id": 759218097, "item_id": 47451131, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47451131", "by": "kombine", "date": "2026-03-19", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I switched to Wayland to years ago when Plasma 6 was released and all the glitches were gone.", "excerpt": "I've been running Plasma Desktop for years and had to put up with graphical glitches in its X11 iteration. I switched to Wayland to years ago when Plasma 6 was released and all the glitches were gone. Additionally, overall snappiness and responsiveness of the desktop and window management improved markedly, I felt like a got a new computer. Granted, I had to acquire an AMD GPU for this transition but it was well wort", "context": "", "use_case": "desktop display", "switched_from": "X11", "story": "Wayland set the Linux Desktop back by 10 years"}, {"id": 743786192, "item_id": 46486637, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46486637", "by": "edent", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've been running Wayland on a Framework laptop and it just works.", "excerpt": "I've been running Wayland on a Framework laptop and it just works. Droves my 4K external monitor, quickly switches to single screen, does fractional scaling well, runs all my apps without complaint. I had an old Chromebook which had Lubuntu on it - screen tearing was driving me crazy so I switched to Wayland and it is buttery smooth. No mean feat given the decrepit hardware. I'm sure someone will be along to tell me ", "context": "Framework laptop user", "use_case": "desktop display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}]}, {"label": "Input methods", "summary": "One user says CJK input methods work better and more consistently.", "quotes": [{"id": 791809568, "item_id": 49488098, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49488098", "by": "ezst", "date": "2026-08-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it addressed some decades-long struggles around multi monitor and DPI layouts", "excerpt": "Matter of fact, the vast majority has moved on to Wayland years ago, both KDE and Gnome have reported their usage stats and neither sees a point in keeping X11 afloat. I too have been using Wayland (KDE) for years, it addressed some decades-long struggles around multi monitor and DPI layouts. I use input methods for CJK that work better and more consistently than before. As far as I'm concerned, this ship has sailed,", "context": "KDE user for years", "use_case": "desktop on KDE", "switched_from": "X11", "story": "Kumander Linux \u2013 A Linux Distro with a Windows 7 Desktop"}]}, {"label": "Secure screen lock", "summary": "One user switched because screen locking on X11 cannot be done securely.", "quotes": [{"id": 759180928, "item_id": 47448808, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47448808", "by": "aussieguy1234", "date": "2026-03-19", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I switched to wayland mainly because screen lock on X11 is not possible to do securely.", "excerpt": "I switched to wayland mainly because screen lock on X11 is not possible to do securely. If some way is found to crash the big screen lock window in X11, the attacker gets access.", "context": "", "use_case": "secure screen lock", "switched_from": "X11", "story": "Wayland set the Linux Desktop back by 10 years"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "Breaks workflows", "summary": "xdotool, xmodmap, wmctrl scripts and older software stop working under Wayland.", "quotes": [{"id": 790070929, "item_id": 49379433, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49379433", "by": "mmh0000", "date": "2026-08-20", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Because it breaks everything.", "excerpt": "That's a new take: Project with new release 1 day ago declared deprecated! I've been using Linux for around 2 decades. I am currently running Fedora 43/KDE Plasma ... and wait for it ... Xorg. Why? Because it works. It works well! Why don't I use Wayland? Because it breaks everything. - Screensharing is just wonky and inconsistent across applications. It has gotten better in the last 2 years, but it's still quite won", "context": "Linux user for around 2 decades", "use_case": "display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Xorg-Server 26.0.99.901"}, {"id": 736025953, "item_id": 46001622, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46001622", "by": "ziotom78", "date": "2025-11-20", "stance": "warn", "quote": "the available solutions were fragile and complicated and took me so long before figuring solutions that only worked partially", "excerpt": "Xdotool and Xmodmap are the two main reasons why, after a few months running Wayland+keyd+dotool I went back to X11. I found really hard to have the following things working at once: - Italian layout for my keyboard with heavily-customized AltGr keys for mathematical notation (in X11 it's just a matter of having a Xmodmap file) - Using Espanso for many common shortcuts like :date: (current YYYY-MM-DD date) and :pidig", "context": "", "use_case": "desktop display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Exploring the Fragmentation of Wayland, an xdotool adventure"}, {"id": 743797392, "item_id": 46487337, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46487337", "by": "Joeboy", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "warn", "quote": "the switch to Wayland has wasted a lot of my time and has no visible benefits", "excerpt": "I recently upgraded to Ubuntu 25.10, and decided to give Wayland another go since X.org isn't installed by default anymore. Good news: My laptop (Lenovo P53) can now suspend / resume successfully. With Ubuntu 25.04 / Wayland it wouldn't resume successfully, which was a deal breaker. Annoying thing: I had a script that I used to organize workspaces using wmctrl, which doesn't work anymore so I had to write a gnome-she", "context": "Ubuntu user", "use_case": "desktop display server", "switched_from": "X.org", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}]}, {"label": "Fragmented compositors", "summary": "Each compositor implements protocols separately, so bugs and behavior differ between desktops.", "quotes": [{"id": 789904929, "item_id": 49369058, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49369058", "by": "rjzzleep", "date": "2026-08-19", "stance": "warn", "quote": "A design that requires everyone to implement their own protocols and everyone to refix the same bugs in their own compositor is inherintly bad.", "excerpt": "Yes, Zoom somehow turned into something like Skype, post acquisition. But, at the same time. A design that requires everyone to implement their own protocols and everyone to refix the same bugs in their own compositor is inherintly bad. I have been using Wayland as my daily driver. Some compositors lacked SHM support in their screen sharing, others have other issues. We only recently got proper text input support, an", "context": "uses Wayland as daily driver", "use_case": "daily driver display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "XWayland 26.1-rc1 Released Two Years After the Last Release"}, {"id": 743784880, "item_id": 46486555, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46486555", "by": "gsliepen", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "compare", "quote": "Wayland is just a protocol, not an implementation. There are many competing implementations", "excerpt": "A rather big problem is that Wayland is just a protocol, not an implementation. There are many competing implementations, like Gnome, KDE and wlroots. The problems you have with one of them might not appear in another. The reference compositor, Weston, is not really usable as a daily driver. So while with Xorg you have a solid base, and desktops are implemented on top of that, with Wayland the each desktop is reinven", "context": "", "use_case": "display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}, {"id": 784974049, "item_id": 49060878, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49060878", "by": "vrighter", "date": "2026-07-26", "stance": "warn", "quote": "let's invent wayland but make sure that there are multiple incompatible implementations of it!", "excerpt": "the oss community has a phobia of having anything in common against all its reimplementations of the same thing. So systemd offers some consistency between distros: bad. X11 was pretty much standardized, that won't do.... let's invent wayland but make sure that there are multiple incompatible implementations of it! and so on. I love linux, but this sort of mentality is ridiculous", "context": "Linux user", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Systemd Linger"}]}, {"label": "Crashes and freezes", "summary": "Some users report kernel crashes, hard freezes and frequent reboots.", "quotes": [{"id": 751607809, "item_id": 46975488, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46975488", "by": "snarfy", "date": "2026-02-11", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Wayland crashes my kernel.  If I want an uptime more than 24 hours I use X11 instead.", "excerpt": "Wayland crashes my kernel. If I want an uptime more than 24 hours I use X11 instead. Try running your app via gamescope https://github.com/ValveSoftware/gamescope", "context": "", "use_case": "display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "The Switch to Linux and the Beginning of My Self-Hosting Journey"}, {"id": 737417968, "item_id": 46088623, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46088623", "by": "estimator7292", "date": "2025-11-29", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I just absolutely love hard-rebooting my computer twice a day.", "excerpt": "I love Wayland. I just absolutely love hard-rebooting my computer twice a day. Oh, need to walk away from the desk? Better switch into a TTY before unplugging the dock so I can force restart SDDM when it crashes. Oh no! Walked out of WiFi range? Your DE is hard frozen and the only operable button is the power button. Wayland truly saves me so much time at work. It's forced me to re-up my ctrl+s reflex. Now I never lo", "context": "uses it at work", "use_case": "desktop display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "KDE going all-in on a Wayland future"}]}, {"label": "Nvidia issues", "summary": "Users with Nvidia drivers or low-memory Nvidia cards report bugs and app crashes.", "quotes": [{"id": 759206416, "item_id": 47450401, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47450401", "by": "kelipso", "date": "2026-03-19", "stance": "warn", "quote": "everyone to encounter some kind of\nbug every time they do anything slightly off the beaten path", "excerpt": "X11 worked fine. Then Wayland came from somebody\u2019s fever dream and forced everyone to use it, just for everyone to encounter some kind of bug every time they do anything slightly off the beaten path. For me literally every new install is some stupid Wayland BS I have to deal with, probably because I use Nvidia drivers, but X11 worked perfectly fine. Wayland should have stayed in the playground as the post says.", "context": "Nvidia driver user", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Wayland set the Linux Desktop back by 10 years"}, {"id": 743844720, "item_id": 46490295, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46490295", "by": "nickjj", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I don't think Wayland is fully ready, at least not with NVIDIA GPUs with limited GPU memory.", "excerpt": "I don't think Wayland is fully ready, at least not with NVIDIA GPUs with limited GPU memory. I have a 7,000 word blog post and demo videos coming out this Tuesday with the details but I think I uncovered a driver bug having switched to native Linux a week ago with a low GPU memory card (750 Ti). Basically on Wayland, apps that request GPU memory will typically crash if there's no more GPU memory to allocate where as ", "context": "Recently switched to native Linux with a 750 Ti", "use_case": "display server on NVIDIA GPU", "switched_from": "", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}]}, {"label": "Input restrictions", "summary": "Low-level device input and global keyboard shortcuts are limited or broken.", "quotes": [{"id": 751469872, "item_id": 46966867, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46966867", "by": "the__alchemist", "date": "2026-02-10", "stance": "warn", "quote": "It has disabled low-level device inputs except for mouse movement. You can use window-based events instead, but IMO this is a mistake.", "excerpt": "For those who switched in the past few years: Has Wayland given you trouble? I was on a journey this morning after testing my software. It's a GUI CAD-style program for structural biology. I test it on Linux periodically to make sure it's cross-platform. The checks usually pass, with some subtlety regarding linking Cuda. Today, I observed that mouse + keyboard inputs to the 3D portion stopped working. Root cause: Ubu", "context": "develops a GUI CAD-style structural biology program", "use_case": "display server for CAD-style app", "switched_from": "", "story": "The Switch to Linux and the Beginning of My Self-Hosting Journey"}, {"id": 743353296, "item_id": 46459581, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46459581", "by": "Daunk", "date": "2026-01-01", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I think Wayland is currently not good for the Linux ecosystem.", "excerpt": "I'm not against Wayland, but I think Wayland is currently not good for the Linux ecosystem. I've had lots of friends try Linux, and they've had issues with Discord global keyboard shortcuts not working, and window positions not restoring at application start, and lots of other small issues, which add up in the end. But once they switched to X11, they've all been very happy.", "context": "", "use_case": "Linux display protocol", "switched_from": "", "story": "Linux is good now; to feel like you actually own your PC, put Linux on it"}]}, {"label": "Screen sharing", "summary": "Screen sharing is described as inconsistent across apps and compositors.", "quotes": [{"id": 790070929, "item_id": 49379433, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49379433", "by": "mmh0000", "date": "2026-08-20", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Because it breaks everything.", "excerpt": "That's a new take: Project with new release 1 day ago declared deprecated! I've been using Linux for around 2 decades. I am currently running Fedora 43/KDE Plasma ... and wait for it ... Xorg. Why? Because it works. It works well! Why don't I use Wayland? Because it breaks everything. - Screensharing is just wonky and inconsistent across applications. It has gotten better in the last 2 years, but it's still quite won", "context": "Linux user for around 2 decades", "use_case": "display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Xorg-Server 26.0.99.901"}, {"id": 789904929, "item_id": 49369058, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49369058", "by": "rjzzleep", "date": "2026-08-19", "stance": "warn", "quote": "A design that requires everyone to implement their own protocols and everyone to refix the same bugs in their own compositor is inherintly bad.", "excerpt": "Yes, Zoom somehow turned into something like Skype, post acquisition. But, at the same time. A design that requires everyone to implement their own protocols and everyone to refix the same bugs in their own compositor is inherintly bad. I have been using Wayland as my daily driver. Some compositors lacked SHM support in their screen sharing, others have other issues. We only recently got proper text input support, an", "context": "uses Wayland as daily driver", "use_case": "daily driver display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "XWayland 26.1-rc1 Released Two Years After the Last Release"}]}], "who": [{"by": "ezst", "context": "KDE user for years", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49488098", "date": "2026-08-29"}, {"by": "sertraline", "context": "AMD iGPU user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49371955", "date": "2026-08-20"}, {"by": "Buxato", "context": "Linux user since 1994", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47455617", "date": "2026-03-20"}, {"by": "throwthro0954", "context": "25 year Linux user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47396119", "date": "2026-03-16"}, {"by": "whalesalad", "context": "Debian 12 user since 2023", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46487904", "date": "2026-01-04"}, {"by": "joelthelion", "context": "simple non-Nvidia hardware", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46486924", "date": "2026-01-04"}, {"by": "fabian2k", "context": "recent Windows-to-Linux switcher", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46486686", "date": "2026-01-04"}, {"by": "edent", "context": "Framework laptop user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46486637", "date": "2026-01-04"}, {"by": "ku1ik", "context": "Linux desktop user for over 20 years", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46478677", "date": "2026-01-03"}], "tags": ["for Linux desktop users", "for KDE Plasma users", "for GNOME users", "for multi-monitor setups", "for HiDPI displays"], "use_cases": ["desktop display server", "display server", "desktop display", "display protocol", "linux display protocol", "desktop on kde"], "compared": [{"slug": "x11", "name": "X11", "co": 27, "switched_from": 5, "switched_to": 3}, {"slug": "xorg", "name": "Xorg", "co": 7, "switched_from": 2, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "kde-plasma", "name": "KDE Plasma", "co": 5, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "gnome", "name": "GNOME", "co": 4, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "xdotool", "name": "xdotool", "co": 3, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "x11libre", "name": "X11Libre", "co": 3, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "x-twitter", "name": "X (Twitter)", "co": 1, "switched_from": 1, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "ubuntu", "name": "Ubuntu", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47448328", "title": "Wayland set the Linux Desktop back by 10 years", "mentions": 9}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46485989", "title": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?", "mentions": 9}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49486176", "title": "Kumander Linux \u2013 A Linux Distro with a Windows 7 Desktop", "mentions": 3}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49373932", "title": "Xorg-Server 26.0.99.901", "mentions": 3}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49366474", "title": "XWayland 26.1-rc1 Released Two Years After the Last Release", "mentions": 2}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47388137", "title": "Separating the Wayland Compositor and Window Manager", "mentions": 2}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {"warn": 4}, "2025-12": {}, "2026-01": {"warn": 4, "recommend": 6, "compare": 2}, "2026-02": {"warn": 2}, "2026-03": {"warn": 5, "recommend": 6}, "2026-04": {}, "2026-05": {"warn": 1}, "2026-06": {"warn": 1}, "2026-07": {"warn": 2}, "2026-08": {"warn": 3, "neutral": 2, "recommend": 3}, "2026-09": {}, "2026-10": {}}, "quotes": [{"id": 791824337, "item_id": 49489021, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49489021", "by": "jck86", "date": "2026-08-29", "stance": "warn", "quote": "won't consider running a wayland only DE at all for the forseable future since it breaks too many things", "excerpt": "Apparently you only want wayland based DEs and considered the argument to be over for everyone. How wrong were you. Lot's of people don't want to use wayland until it reaches a certain feature-complete maturity. I for instance have again put it off for another year and won't consider running a wayland only DE at all for the forseable future since it breaks too many things for no good reason and I need to be able to s", "context": "uses PC for work", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Kumander Linux \u2013 A Linux Distro with a Windows 7 Desktop"}, {"id": 791809568, "item_id": 49488098, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49488098", "by": "ezst", "date": "2026-08-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it addressed some decades-long struggles around multi monitor and DPI layouts", "excerpt": "Matter of fact, the vast majority has moved on to Wayland years ago, both KDE and Gnome have reported their usage stats and neither sees a point in keeping X11 afloat. I too have been using Wayland (KDE) for years, it addressed some decades-long struggles around multi monitor and DPI layouts. I use input methods for CJK that work better and more consistently than before. As far as I'm concerned, this ship has sailed,", "context": "KDE user for years", "use_case": "desktop on KDE", "switched_from": "X11", "story": "Kumander Linux \u2013 A Linux Distro with a Windows 7 Desktop"}, {"id": 791802400, "item_id": 49487650, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49487650", "by": "kombine", "date": "2026-08-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've been using Wayland for two and a half years and it's been more stable than X11", "excerpt": "> wayland is not cross platform nor stable. I've been using Wayland for two and a half years and it's been more stable than X11 that I've been using prior for years.", "context": "", "use_case": "desktop display server", "switched_from": "X11", "story": "Kumander Linux \u2013 A Linux Distro with a Windows 7 Desktop"}, {"id": 790352544, "item_id": 49397034, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49397034", "by": "throwaway84933", "date": "2026-08-22", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "It simply makes using your computer so much more pleasant.", "excerpt": "> Curiously, people always seem to list the same advantages, and it's a very short list. The things I listed are just the tip of the iceberg. Having studied earlier versions of X like X10, X11, and now Wayland, I could go on and on. What I'm trying to emphasize here is not to look at Wayland through an Xorg lens. I know it's easy to look at Wayland and immediately think it's a rigid protocol that breaks everything, b", "context": "", "use_case": "display protocol", "switched_from": "", "story": "Xorg-Server 26.0.99.901"}, {"id": 790075056, "item_id": 49379691, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49379691", "by": "sbinnee", "date": "2026-08-20", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "even if you daily drive wayland. Since 2024 or so however I don\u2019t remember opening a xorg session.", "excerpt": "I used to run xorg and wayland together and switch between them because you know you setup xorg no matter what even if you daily drive wayland. Since 2024 or so however I don\u2019t remember opening a xorg session.", "context": "", "use_case": "daily desktop session", "switched_from": "Xorg", "story": "Xorg-Server 26.0.99.901"}, {"id": 790070929, "item_id": 49379433, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49379433", "by": "mmh0000", "date": "2026-08-20", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Because it breaks everything.", "excerpt": "That's a new take: Project with new release 1 day ago declared deprecated! I've been using Linux for around 2 decades. I am currently running Fedora 43/KDE Plasma ... and wait for it ... Xorg. Why? Because it works. It works well! Why don't I use Wayland? Because it breaks everything. - Screensharing is just wonky and inconsistent across applications. It has gotten better in the last 2 years, but it's still quite won", "context": "Linux user for around 2 decades", "use_case": "display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Xorg-Server 26.0.99.901"}, {"id": 789951282, "item_id": 49371955, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49371955", "by": "sertraline", "date": "2026-08-20", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I'm personally a Wayland user", "excerpt": "Yep, it is important to remember Metux was a sole guy supporting Xorg for many years while everybody else outright refused to touch the codebase. Then they blamed Metux for \"breaking compatibility.\" While this sounds like a plausible reason, long time Linux users could recall that every major X release broke something in one way or another. It's just how it is, there is no way around it. They blamed Metux for doing s", "context": "AMD iGPU user", "use_case": "display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "XWayland 26.1-rc1 Released Two Years After the Last Release"}, {"id": 789904929, "item_id": 49369058, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49369058", "by": "rjzzleep", "date": "2026-08-19", "stance": "warn", "quote": "A design that requires everyone to implement their own protocols and everyone to refix the same bugs in their own compositor is inherintly bad.", "excerpt": "Yes, Zoom somehow turned into something like Skype, post acquisition. But, at the same time. A design that requires everyone to implement their own protocols and everyone to refix the same bugs in their own compositor is inherintly bad. I have been using Wayland as my daily driver. Some compositors lacked SHM support in their screen sharing, others have other issues. We only recently got proper text input support, an", "context": "uses Wayland as daily driver", "use_case": "daily driver display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "XWayland 26.1-rc1 Released Two Years After the Last Release"}, {"id": 784974049, "item_id": 49060878, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49060878", "by": "vrighter", "date": "2026-07-26", "stance": "warn", "quote": "let's invent wayland but make sure that there are multiple incompatible implementations of it!", "excerpt": "the oss community has a phobia of having anything in common against all its reimplementations of the same thing. So systemd offers some consistency between distros: bad. X11 was pretty much standardized, that won't do.... let's invent wayland but make sure that there are multiple incompatible implementations of it! and so on. I love linux, but this sort of mentality is ridiculous", "context": "Linux user", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Systemd Linger"}, {"id": 782581521, "item_id": 48911345, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48911345", "by": "umanwizard", "date": "2026-07-14", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Wayland has not, despite Wayland advocates claiming it's ready", "excerpt": "It's really not like Emacs/vim. I use X because it works on my setup and always has, whereas Wayland has not, despite Wayland advocates claiming it's ready and X is deprecated for 10+ years.", "context": "", "use_case": "display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Measuring Input Latency on Linux: X11 vs. Wayland, VRR, and DXVK"}, {"id": 776542656, "item_id": 48533916, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48533916", "by": "simoncion", "date": "2026-06-14", "stance": "warn", "quote": "it looks like common Wayland compositors [0] still kill clients that can't keep up with \"high speed\" event generators like 1kHz mice.", "excerpt": "> But imagine some piece of exotic hardware, e.g. computer mouse, that reports its movement at 1000Hz. Speaking of... it looks like common Wayland compositors [0] still kill clients that can't keep up with \"high speed\" event generators like 1kHz mice. [1] So, that's nice. (For people who plan to retort with \"just handle events in a timely manner\", check out the comment here [2]. OSX, Windows, and X11 all cope just fi", "context": "", "use_case": "display protocol", "switched_from": "", "story": "Yserver: A modern X11 server written in Rust"}, {"id": 769826784, "item_id": 48114174, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48114174", "by": "hulitu", "date": "2026-05-12", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Wayland is a solution asking for a problem.", "excerpt": "> Say you use Linux as a daily driver, and find it amazing? Whatever you're smoking, it must be really strong. Can I have some ? Linux is not UNIX. The bloat has exceeded the level of Windows. Wayland is a solution asking for a problem.", "context": "", "use_case": "display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Beneath the Linux surface: the Unix legacy, a lively ecology"}, {"id": 759289872, "item_id": 47455617, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47455617", "by": "Buxato", "date": "2026-03-20", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I began using Wayland since this last Kubuntu 25.10", "excerpt": "It seems more that the cat with tinfoil is him. I have been using Linux partially since 1994 and exclusively since 2010 (aprox), never more things were so \"just work\" and smooth for me like right now. I began using Wayland since this last Kubuntu 25.10, because before even if some things were better I have few problems with my work software, now suspend its perfect, desktop grid with videogames is perfect, multi moni", "context": "Linux user since 1994", "use_case": "desktop display", "switched_from": "", "story": "Wayland set the Linux Desktop back by 10 years"}, {"id": 759289120, "item_id": 47455570, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47455570", "by": "pgwalsh", "date": "2026-03-20", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Wayland is the future and yes it took some time but I've been using it for a while.", "excerpt": "Wayland is the future and yes it took some time but I've been using it for a while. Sure there are annoyances but nothing terrible. People complained about pipewire and wireplumber too, but they're fantastic. It's great in the DAW. It just takes a long time to get everything compatible.", "context": "", "use_case": "desktop display", "switched_from": "", "story": "Wayland set the Linux Desktop back by 10 years"}, {"id": 759234673, "item_id": 47452167, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47452167", "by": "a2128", "date": "2026-03-20", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use Wayland exclusively everyday", "excerpt": "OBS can't screen record (it segfaults instead), I can't copy-paste, and I can't see window previews unless everything implements a specific extension to the core protocol. I can't take articles like this seriously when they so confidently make such statements that so directly conflict with reality. I use Wayland exclusively everyday and I screen record with OBS on both KDE and GNOME on multiple machines with no issue", "context": "", "use_case": "desktop display", "switched_from": "", "story": "Wayland set the Linux Desktop back by 10 years"}, {"id": 759218097, "item_id": 47451131, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47451131", "by": "kombine", "date": "2026-03-19", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I switched to Wayland to years ago when Plasma 6 was released and all the glitches were gone.", "excerpt": "I've been running Plasma Desktop for years and had to put up with graphical glitches in its X11 iteration. I switched to Wayland to years ago when Plasma 6 was released and all the glitches were gone. Additionally, overall snappiness and responsiveness of the desktop and window management improved markedly, I felt like a got a new computer. Granted, I had to acquire an AMD GPU for this transition but it was well wort", "context": "", "use_case": "desktop display", "switched_from": "X11", "story": "Wayland set the Linux Desktop back by 10 years"}, {"id": 759206416, "item_id": 47450401, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47450401", "by": "kelipso", "date": "2026-03-19", "stance": "warn", "quote": "everyone to encounter some kind of\nbug every time they do anything slightly off the beaten path", "excerpt": "X11 worked fine. Then Wayland came from somebody\u2019s fever dream and forced everyone to use it, just for everyone to encounter some kind of bug every time they do anything slightly off the beaten path. For me literally every new install is some stupid Wayland BS I have to deal with, probably because I use Nvidia drivers, but X11 worked perfectly fine. Wayland should have stayed in the playground as the post says.", "context": "Nvidia driver user", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Wayland set the Linux Desktop back by 10 years"}, {"id": 759187344, "item_id": 47449209, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47449209", "by": "erelong", "date": "2026-03-19", "stance": "warn", "quote": "wayland still isn't there and I end up having to not use it for that reason", "excerpt": "is it possible to create another alternative to both x11 and wayland that might correct some of these issues? (especially now with ai assistance?) I can see arguments for improving x11 but wayland still isn't there and I end up having to not use it for that reason", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Wayland set the Linux Desktop back by 10 years"}, {"id": 759185233, "item_id": 47449077, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47449077", "by": "geophile", "date": "2026-03-19", "stance": "warn", "quote": "many people are having serious problems. From what I can tell, it\u2019s not a good choice for me yet.", "excerpt": "I have been using Pop_OS for many years, and I\u2019m still on 22.04, which uses X11. I don\u2019t understand the pros and cons of X11 vs. Wayland, I just want a working desktop. 24.04 uses Wayland, and while some people have had no problems migrating, many people are having serious problems. From what I can tell, it\u2019s not a good choice for me yet. This article tells me that it may not be a good choice ever. I am a huge fan of", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Wayland set the Linux Desktop back by 10 years"}, {"id": 759180928, "item_id": 47448808, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47448808", "by": "aussieguy1234", "date": "2026-03-19", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I switched to wayland mainly because screen lock on X11 is not possible to do securely.", "excerpt": "I switched to wayland mainly because screen lock on X11 is not possible to do securely. If some way is found to crash the big screen lock window in X11, the attacker gets access.", "context": "", "use_case": "secure screen lock", "switched_from": "X11", "story": "Wayland set the Linux Desktop back by 10 years"}, {"id": 759179569, "item_id": 47448723, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47448723", "by": "jmclnx", "date": "2026-03-19", "stance": "warn", "quote": "And this is my biggest issue with Wayland.", "excerpt": "people may remember 'Y' from many years ago, AFAIK it was suppose to replace X, but never got to the point were Wayland is now. >The original conceit behind Wayland is to only implement what is needed for a simple Linux desktop And this is my biggest issue with Wayland. If it started out with portability in mind maybe I would give it a try. But I am sticking with X because it is fully usable on the BSDs.", "context": "BSD user", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Wayland set the Linux Desktop back by 10 years"}, {"id": 758337904, "item_id": 47396119, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47396119", "by": "throwthro0954", "date": "2026-03-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "As a 25 year user of Linux I love wayland since cutting over to it about 5 years ago. No tearing ever", "excerpt": "As a 25 year user of Linux I love wayland since cutting over to it about 5 years ago. No tearing ever, which I always had to battle with with X. Certain developers that must interact with the Wayland stack will have to do more work now, and some projects may not still be viable, I get it. I've been following the comments in Linux forums for years. But users exist too, and here is one data point for you.", "context": "25 year Linux user", "use_case": "Linux desktop display", "switched_from": "X", "story": "Separating the Wayland Compositor and Window Manager"}, {"id": 758274929, "item_id": 47392183, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47392183", "by": "shevy-java", "date": "2026-03-15", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Wayland broke its biggest promise: that it is a viable alternative to the xorg-server.", "excerpt": "Many theories. A simple one is that corporations wanted more control. See systemd's rise - not related to wayland as such, but to corporate-driven influence. I am not saying all of the design is corporate-controlled. But a ton of propaganda is associated with how wayland was advertised, until some folks had enough with it and decided to stop buying the \"xorg is dead\" routine these corporations push on: https://github", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Separating the Wayland Compositor and Window Manager"}, {"id": 751607809, "item_id": 46975488, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46975488", "by": "snarfy", "date": "2026-02-11", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Wayland crashes my kernel.  If I want an uptime more than 24 hours I use X11 instead.", "excerpt": "Wayland crashes my kernel. If I want an uptime more than 24 hours I use X11 instead. Try running your app via gamescope https://github.com/ValveSoftware/gamescope", "context": "", "use_case": "display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "The Switch to Linux and the Beginning of My Self-Hosting Journey"}, {"id": 751469872, "item_id": 46966867, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46966867", "by": "the__alchemist", "date": "2026-02-10", "stance": "warn", "quote": "It has disabled low-level device inputs except for mouse movement. You can use window-based events instead, but IMO this is a mistake.", "excerpt": "For those who switched in the past few years: Has Wayland given you trouble? I was on a journey this morning after testing my software. It's a GUI CAD-style program for structural biology. I test it on Linux periodically to make sure it's cross-platform. The checks usually pass, with some subtlety regarding linking Cuda. Today, I observed that mouse + keyboard inputs to the 3D portion stopped working. Root cause: Ubu", "context": "develops a GUI CAD-style structural biology program", "use_case": "display server for CAD-style app", "switched_from": "", "story": "The Switch to Linux and the Beginning of My Self-Hosting Journey"}, {"id": 743844720, "item_id": 46490295, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46490295", "by": "nickjj", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I don't think Wayland is fully ready, at least not with NVIDIA GPUs with limited GPU memory.", "excerpt": "I don't think Wayland is fully ready, at least not with NVIDIA GPUs with limited GPU memory. I have a 7,000 word blog post and demo videos coming out this Tuesday with the details but I think I uncovered a driver bug having switched to native Linux a week ago with a low GPU memory card (750 Ti). Basically on Wayland, apps that request GPU memory will typically crash if there's no more GPU memory to allocate where as ", "context": "Recently switched to native Linux with a 750 Ti", "use_case": "display server on NVIDIA GPU", "switched_from": "", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}, {"id": 743824672, "item_id": 46489042, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46489042", "by": "jlarocco", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "compare", "quote": "I honestly don't have a preference between Wayland and X", "excerpt": "I'm not switching to Wayland until my window manager supports it. It doesn't look like anybody has time to do the work, so I'll probably switch, grudgingly, to XWayland whenever X gets removed from Debian. I feel like the biggest issue for Wayland is the long tail of people using alternative WMs. A lot of those projects don't have manpower to do what amounts to a complete rewrite. I honestly don't have a preference b", "context": "Debian user with alternative window manager", "use_case": "display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}, {"id": 743806464, "item_id": 46487904, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46487904", "by": "whalesalad", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Literally everything \u201cjust works\u201d and has been a joy to use.", "excerpt": "I\u2019ve been using Wayland on Debian 12 since 2023. On an Apple Studio Display (5K) over thunderbolt (the built-in camera, speakers, etc work fine) I screen share and video call with Slack and Google Meet. I use alacritty/zsh/tmux as my terminal. I use chromium as my browser, vscode and sublime text as code editors. Slack, Spotify, my studio mic, my Scarlett 2i2, 10gbe networking, thunderbolt, Logitech unifying receiver", "context": "Debian 12 user since 2023", "use_case": "daily desktop on Debian", "switched_from": "", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}, {"id": 743797392, "item_id": 46487337, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46487337", "by": "Joeboy", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "warn", "quote": "the switch to Wayland has wasted a lot of my time and has no visible benefits", "excerpt": "I recently upgraded to Ubuntu 25.10, and decided to give Wayland another go since X.org isn't installed by default anymore. Good news: My laptop (Lenovo P53) can now suspend / resume successfully. With Ubuntu 25.04 / Wayland it wouldn't resume successfully, which was a deal breaker. Annoying thing: I had a script that I used to organize workspaces using wmctrl, which doesn't work anymore so I had to write a gnome-she", "context": "Ubuntu user", "use_case": "desktop display server", "switched_from": "X.org", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}, {"id": 743791201, "item_id": 46486950, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46486950", "by": "zeta0134", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "crashes regularly under X11 nearly every time I open a new window, but is perfectly stable under wayland", "excerpt": "KDE Plasma switched to Wayland by default sometime last year, and so far the main issue I run into is that a few screen recording tools I like stopped working. (Mostly simplescreenrecorder, which seems to be entirely unmaintained at this point.) Other than some initial instability with accelerated rendering on my GPU, which was quickly addressed, it kinda just works. I mostly don't notice. Actually, GPU acceleration ", "context": "", "use_case": "desktop display server", "switched_from": "X11", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}, {"id": 743790784, "item_id": 46486924, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46486924", "by": "joelthelion", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've been using wayland with Gnome for years without a single issue.", "excerpt": "I've been using wayland with Gnome for years without a single issue. Arguably my hardware is a lot simpler and I don't use Nvidia. But I just want to point out that, for all the flak wayland receives, it can work quite well.", "context": "simple non-Nvidia hardware", "use_case": "desktop display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}, {"id": 743786976, "item_id": 46486686, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46486686", "by": "fabian2k", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Wayland fixes that, so that part is a huge improvement to me.", "excerpt": "I just recently switched to Linux since I had some weird Windows issues I couldn't fix. I've tried to switch a few times before, but the main problem at some point was that I didn't have proper fractional scaling on Linux. And that alone pretty much made Linux unusable for me on my specific hardware. Wayland fixes that, so that part is a huge improvement to me. Unfortunately this also limited my choice of Distros as ", "context": "recent Windows-to-Linux switcher", "use_case": "fractional scaling", "switched_from": "", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}, {"id": 743786192, "item_id": 46486637, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46486637", "by": "edent", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've been running Wayland on a Framework laptop and it just works.", "excerpt": "I've been running Wayland on a Framework laptop and it just works. Droves my 4K external monitor, quickly switches to single screen, does fractional scaling well, runs all my apps without complaint. I had an old Chromebook which had Lubuntu on it - screen tearing was driving me crazy so I switched to Wayland and it is buttery smooth. No mean feat given the decrepit hardware. I'm sure someone will be along to tell me ", "context": "Framework laptop user", "use_case": "desktop display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}, {"id": 743784880, "item_id": 46486555, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46486555", "by": "gsliepen", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "compare", "quote": "Wayland is just a protocol, not an implementation. There are many competing implementations", "excerpt": "A rather big problem is that Wayland is just a protocol, not an implementation. There are many competing implementations, like Gnome, KDE and wlroots. The problems you have with one of them might not appear in another. The reference compositor, Weston, is not really usable as a daily driver. So while with Xorg you have a solid base, and desktops are implemented on top of that, with Wayland the each desktop is reinven", "context": "", "use_case": "display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}, {"id": 743658835, "item_id": 46478677, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46478677", "by": "ku1ik", "date": "2026-01-03", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "on my standard GNOME 48 / Wayland / PipeWire desktop I'd be able to use Firefox for this call", "excerpt": "Here's a copy of my Mastodon post [1] from Oct 2025: --- I had a job interview yesterday, which happened via Google Meet. Even though I use my desktop Linux workstation and Firefox 99% of the time for everything, my first instinct was to do this interview on a MacBook and Chrome, to avoid surprises and not look unprofessional if something doesn't work, which has happened in the past. Last year, when I was asked to sh", "context": "Linux desktop user for over 20 years", "use_case": "display server, desktop sharing", "switched_from": "", "story": "2026 will be my year of the Linux desktop"}, {"id": 743433824, "item_id": 46464614, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46464614", "by": "shevy-java", "date": "2026-01-02", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Things that work on xorg-server still do not work on wayland - and probably never will.", "excerpt": "I have been using Linux since almost 23 years now. I don't praise it as flawless in any way, but compared to Microsoft it is a much more efficient operating system. Top 500 supercomputers also running Linux kind of hint that Linux is very good. Despite this, Linux as ecosystem has numerous problems. The \"wayland is the future\" annoys me a lot. The wayland protocol was released in 2008. Now it is almost 20 years. I do", "context": "Linux user for 23 years", "use_case": "Linux display protocol", "switched_from": "", "story": "Linux is good now; to feel like you actually own your PC, put Linux on it"}, {"id": 743353296, "item_id": 46459581, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46459581", "by": "Daunk", "date": "2026-01-01", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I think Wayland is currently not good for the Linux ecosystem.", "excerpt": "I'm not against Wayland, but I think Wayland is currently not good for the Linux ecosystem. I've had lots of friends try Linux, and they've had issues with Discord global keyboard shortcuts not working, and window positions not restoring at application start, and lots of other small issues, which add up in the end. But once they switched to X11, they've all been very happy.", "context": "", "use_case": "Linux display protocol", "switched_from": "", "story": "Linux is good now; to feel like you actually own your PC, put Linux on it"}, {"id": 737417968, "item_id": 46088623, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46088623", "by": "estimator7292", "date": "2025-11-29", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I just absolutely love hard-rebooting my computer twice a day.", "excerpt": "I love Wayland. I just absolutely love hard-rebooting my computer twice a day. Oh, need to walk away from the desk? Better switch into a TTY before unplugging the dock so I can force restart SDDM when it crashes. Oh no! Walked out of WiFi range? Your DE is hard frozen and the only operable button is the power button. Wayland truly saves me so much time at work. It's forced me to re-up my ctrl+s reflex. Now I never lo", "context": "uses it at work", "use_case": "desktop display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "KDE going all-in on a Wayland future"}, {"id": 736955376, "item_id": 46059711, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46059711", "by": "OhMeadhbh", "date": "2025-11-26", "stance": "warn", "quote": "doesn't work under Wayland", "excerpt": "Half of the software I use on a daily basis (lots of old SunOS-era custom data reduction software) doesn't work under Wayland. Guess I'll finally flip my daily driver over to *BSD.", "context": "uses old SunOS-era custom data reduction software", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "KDE Plasma 6.8 Will Go Wayland-Exclusive in Dropping X11 Session Support"}, {"id": 736237665, "item_id": 46014854, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46014854", "by": "clemens3", "date": "2025-11-22", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I don't see it improves on any use case I have, but actively disables functionality I need.", "excerpt": "I am surprised, 87 comments and so far nobody has mentioned X11Libre. They claim 30 developers right now. Don't know if true and if they are any good, but when the time comes to update my xserver, I will have a look at them - just to show my support. Ah aeh, Wayland, it too got pitched to me recently. But I don't see it improves on any use case I have, but actively disables functionality I need. So a big no go and pa", "context": "long-time Linux user", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Exploring the Fragmentation of Wayland, an xdotool adventure"}, {"id": 736025953, "item_id": 46001622, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46001622", "by": "ziotom78", "date": "2025-11-20", "stance": "warn", "quote": "the available solutions were fragile and complicated and took me so long before figuring solutions that only worked partially", "excerpt": "Xdotool and Xmodmap are the two main reasons why, after a few months running Wayland+keyd+dotool I went back to X11. I found really hard to have the following things working at once: - Italian layout for my keyboard with heavily-customized AltGr keys for mathematical notation (in X11 it's just a matter of having a Xmodmap file) - Using Espanso for many common shortcuts like :date: (current YYYY-MM-DD date) and :pidig", "context": "", "use_case": "desktop display server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Exploring the Fragmentation of Wayland, an xdotool adventure"}]}