Fedora Linux 44 is out now as one of the best Linux distributions

Fedora Linux 44 is officially here and with it tons of new features across different spins, continuing to be one of the best Linux distributions. For now, I still stand by recommendation of Fedora KDE as the best Linux distribution for gaming in 2026. And now, even more so!

Pictured - my install of Fedora KDE 44

From the release announcement on some user-facing changes:

Anaconda

For those of you installing fresh Fedora Linux 44 Spins, you may notice a change in how Anaconda handles network devices. Anaconda now only creates network profiles for devices configured during installation (by boot options, kickstart, or interactively in UI) instead of providing default profiles for all devices. This change will simplify post-installation network configuration for users who need to customize after installation.

Workstation

Fedora Linux 44 Workstation ships with the latest GNOME release, GNOME 50. This comes with a long list of refinements to your desktop, including everything from accessibility to color management and remote desktop. Many of the applications that are installed by default on Fedora Workstation have also seen improvements, from Document Viewer to File Manager and Calendar.

KDE Plasma Desktop

KDE Plasma Desktop: If you are a KDE user, you should also notice a couple of very obvious changes. Fedora KDE Plasma Desktop 44 is based on the latest Plasma 6.6, which includes the new Plasma Login Manager and Plasma Setup to provide a more cohesive and integrated experience from the moment the computer is powered on for the first time. The installation process has been simplified, enabling you to easily set up Fedora KDE Plasma Desktop for a computer for a friend or a loved one.

Wine NTSYNC

The NTSYNC kernel module is enabled for select packages by package recommendation (notably Wine and Steam), which can improve compatibility and performance when running Windows applications (especially games). When packages that recommend the wine-ntsync package are installed, the package recommendation ensures NTSYNC is configured automatically on subsequent boots, so that users don’t have to manually enable NTSYNC.

You get Mesa 26.0.3 for nicely up to date open source graphics drivers with various performance improvements and bug fixes, along with Linux kernel 6.19.14 with Linux kernel 7.0 due out sometime soon for it via updates for even better hardware support.

I upgraded from Fedora KDE 43 to 44 yesterday, and it all went rather smoothly. Firefox complained about low disk space, and required me to delete some cookies as it weirdly seemed to think WhatsApp web was taking up a great many GBs. Apart from that, absolutely silky-smooth. Easily one of the simplest Linux distro updates I've ever done.

See the full release notes for more and download from the Fedora website.