The Linux Mint team have released the official beta of the next major version of the popular Linux distro, Linux Mint 22.

Linux Mint 22 is based on the recently released Ubuntu 24.04 and will be supported until 2029. The Mint team have been at work rebasing on the new version of Ubuntu, as well as adding a number of new features and addressing several issues:

Linux Mint 22 ships with modern components and the new Ubuntu 24.04 package base.

To guarantee better compatibility with modern hardware, the kernel is version 6.8 and Linux Mint 22.x point releases will follow the HWE series.

The default sound server switched to Pipewire.

The Software Sources received support for the new Debian DEB822 format.

Themes were updated to support GTK4.

JXL support was added to Pix and a new thumbnailer was implemented for it.

All software using libsoup2 was migrated to libsoup3.

HiDPI support improvements were made in the boot sequence, in Plymouth and Slick-Greeter.

Linux Mint 22 also improves language support, saving disk space by removing preinstalled language packs that are not in use.

The new version also makes changes to some of the included apps, rolling them back to GTK3 versions (instead of GTK4) to improve compatibility with Mint’s theming options. The team have made improvements to the Software Manager, improving performance and changing how Flatpaks are handled. By default, the Software Manager will only show Verified Flatpaks, although the behavior can be changed in the preferences.

Linux Mint 22 also comes with version 6.2 of the flagship desktop environment, Cinnamon. While not a major upgrade to Cinnamon, version 6.2 has a number of improvements, including the following:

• Less printer added notifications (silenced for 2 hours)
• Wayland support: Clutter polkit agent
• Spices: keybindings support
• Better avatar support in polkit agent and user applet
• Workspace switcher: middle click removes the workspace being hovered
• Keybindings: ability to search by binding
• Cornerbar applet: shift+click action added
• Applets: improved precision in reporting VPN and battery states

Users who want to participate in the beta and help report bugs can find download links here.