Fedora Linux 41 is now available for desktops, servers, and IoT devices. The main Workstation version has the latest GNOME 47 desktop and several other big updates.
The most important change in Fedora Workstation 41 is the latest GNOME 47 desktop environment. That’s the same desktop as Ubuntu 24.10, though Fedora sticks much closer to the “stock” GNOME experience, without the custom shell and other modifications from Canonical. Fedora also doesn’t have any Snap applications installed by default, and generally sticks closer to the Flatpak ecosystem, though you can still install Snap apps. There are other Fedora ‘spins’ with different desktop environments—the KDE spin of Fedora 41 has Plasma 6.2, for example.
GNOME 47 allows you to customize the standard blue accent color of the main interface, adding a splash of customization to your desktop. It also works better on small and low-resolution screens than previous versions, and the Files app has been revamped with simpler navigation and a better search. The GNOME 47 update has many performance improvements as well, including faster GTK rendering, hardware encoding on Intel and AMD GPUs when recording the screen, and more.
Fedora 41 now uses DNF 5 as the default package management tool (Fedora’s equivalent to apt on Debian and Ubuntu-like systems). The team said, “This version is faster, smaller and requires fewer supporting packages. This eliminates the need for “microdnf” for containers and memory-constrained systems — now, the same DNF can be used across containers, servers, desktops and devices.”
Secure Boot also works again on PCs using Nvidia’s proprietary GPU driver, and more types of laptop webcams are now supported. Also, Ptyxis is the new default terminal app in Fedora 41, with native support for light and dark mode and customizable keyboard shortcuts.
Fedora Linux is developed by The Fedora Project, and it shares some lineage and system components (like the DNF package manager) with Red Hat Enterprise Linux. Fedora Workstation is one of the best ways to use the GNOME desktop, as it (usually) has a more up-to-date version with fewer modifications than Ubuntu Linux. Fedora also has several “atomic desktop” versions with a more reliant system and most graphical applications running in Flatpak.
You can download Fedora Workstation now for 64-bit x86 PCs, 64-bit ARM systems, or Power ppc64le PCs. The other editions for servers, IoT devices, and other platforms are also being updated to version 41.