Canonical has released the beta build of Ubuntu 25.04 ‘Plucky Puffin’ as we get closer to the final launch date, April 17th. With just weeks to go, the beta gives you a pretty good idea of what the final release will look like. Additionally, it should be free of showstopper or installer bugs, so you can probably try it out without too many issues.
Included in this beta is the Linux 6.14 kernel, this is extremely new, having been released on Sunday, March 24th. The kernel in Linux is the core that includes most hardware drivers so keeping this up to date ensures new hardware will work properly in Ubuntu.
It also includes the brand new GNOME 48 which came out just last week and features notification stacking, performance improvements, new fonts, digital well-being settings, an updated image viewer, and much more. Ubuntu is one of the easiest ways to try out the latest and greatest GNOME release.
Other than these, core applications of Ubuntu have also been updated. Included are Firefox 136, LibreOffice 25.2, Thunderbird 128, and GIMP 3.0 (this is a major upgrade). The Evince PDF reader has been replaced by a fork called Paper which has been updated to use GTK4 and is partially written in the memory-safe programming language, Rust.
The Ubuntu 25.04 beta isn’t just available for desktop, but for Server, Cloud, and the various spins such as Kubuntu. You can find download links for all of the different versions on this mailing list announcement.
While Canonical has been pushing daily images of this release since development began, this beta release will spark interest among a wider audience who can test it out on a wider array of hardware so that bugs can be fixed before the final release next month. To learn how to report issues, check out this relevant Ubuntu Help page.
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