This was written to clarify how we support Linux and what that means to Framework users.

Officially Supported Linux Distributions: 

- Official support means we work directly with the Ubuntu and Fedora teams to do our best to avoid bugs and regressions. 

- We provide official support for Ubuntu 24.04 LTS release. 

- We provide official support for Fedora 41.

- NEW: We provide official support for Bazzite. 

Previously Bazzite was a community supported distro, but for 2025 Bazzite has become an officially supported distribution! 

- We provide consistently updated install guides.

- We provide support ticket assistance.

- We provide help through the community forums.

Compatible Community Supported Linux Distributions:

- Community support for Project Bluefin, Linux Mint, NixOS and Arch Linux. 

-  Those distro communities provide periodically updated install guides.

-  Those distro communities provide best efforts assistance through the community forums.

- If a Framework ticket is opened, we ask you to test against officially supported distros mentioned above (Ubuntu LTS and Fedora), for community supported releases we will redirect the customer to the support forum for their distribution.

Untested Linux Distributions:

- Any distribution or release not listed above.

Important: As with any operating system, updates can introduce regressions or bugs that sneak by developers. We work hard to avoid this, but it can and does happen. We recommend ensuring you have a consistently backed up home directory or disk image if you have a development environment that is difficult to replicate.

Support for my distro:

We have customers running an amazing range of distros. 

- Users are encouraged to run whichever distro they would like. Often, we have forum threads that may already address existing challenges for your specific distro. 

- We are a tiny team of two for Linux support, so we have to laser focus on distros we support.

- When troubleshooting an issue experienced in a ticket, we need to be able to replicate the experienced issue on a laptop config known to be working. This allows us to dial down on what is happening, configuration errors, update bugs or in some limited instances, a hardware challenge.

- (Updated) The Community Supported Distro program is expanding in 2025 onward. Keep an eye on our Linux Landing Page for updates! 

So what does it mean on the Linux Landing Page with terms like Stable/Some Risk or Medium Difficulty? Believe it or not, these are not negative or positive designations. Rather, these are tools to provide guidance of expectations for those who are just coming to Linux and may not understand why something works one way on one distribution, works completely differently on another distribution of Linux.

Wi-Fi and Bluetooth/Fingerprint Reader:

• Plug in play, ready to enroll/connect = Works out of the box
• Some configuration/packages needed to be selected/installed = Works with workarounds
• Building needed items from source, scouring around how to use them, other additional layers of complexity = Not officially supported.

Stability:

• The release passes QA/EUT with a known to be working state/kernel, we have a place where we know there is a good working state out of the box = Stable
• The release is not tested heavily other than by the community or by us in our free time, or it's rolling whereas the state evolves with each update. We cannot boot to a Live USB for a known good state as a comparable for support = Some Risk
• High Risk (None listed at this time)

Ease of Setup:

• Boot USB key, follow GUI steps presented, reboot, done = Easy
• Boot USB key, follow provided steps/instructions, make appropriate selections based on preferences, if something is not know - research as needed, then make your selections = Medium
• Boot USB key, follow provided steps/instructions, make appropriate selections based on preferences, deal with no dependency resolution and/or configure/build your own kernel = Difficult