COSMIC 1.5.0 Released with Improved Multi-Monitor & hybrid-GPU Support

COSMIC Epoch, the default desktop environment for Pop!_OS, released the new 1.5.0 version just a week since the last version.

The new version of this free open-source Linux Desktop includes mostly bug-fixes and stability improvements for better multiple monitor setup and hybrid-GPU laptops support.

COSMIC desktop in Ubuntu 26.04

It fixed the panel applet rendering issue with frosted-glass effect, which was introduced in 1.3.0 release, when an external monitor connected after login. Also, when using the frosted-glass effect, it fixed the panel/dock flickering issue while keeping the panel/dock style during maximized windows.

It also fixed a popup management bug when creating new popups across multiple monitors, and, fixed a small display alignment bug where the desktop could accidentally leave a 1-pixel gap between monitors because of rounding mistakes when calculating screen positions.

The wallpaper setting page now supports adding multiple images at once. And, it increased the number of wallpaper directory loading limit from 100 to 500. It as well fixed the wallpaper rotation bug caused by missing EXIF orientation handling, and improved the wallpaper slider UI.

wallpaper setting can now loading at most 500 images, and support adding multi-images at once

For hybrid-GPU laptops, it fixed the KMS (Kernel Mode Setting) correctness issue that prevents crash during compositor shutdown and display reconfiguration failure when a GPU does not own DRM master access.

And, it improved stability on AMD hybrid laptops and prevents a GPU recovery event from logging the user out of the entire COSMIC session.

COSMIC Epoch 1.5.0 added cosmic-keymap-unstable-v1 support for the login greeter, a COSMIC-specific Wayland protocol for handling keyboard layout/keymap information.

It also adds cursor capture metadata support for screen sharing and screencasting, which improves compatibility with apps like OBS, video conferencing tools, and browsers.

It now handles touchscreens more like mouse input, that keeps touch-created popups working correctly and avoids accidentally closing popups when keyboard focus changes between panels.

Other changes in the release include:

• Workaround for Chromium-based apps failing when using fractional scaling below 100%.
• Fix high CPU usage bug when the screen is locked.
• Fix X11 games lose keyboard input after being restored from fullscreen/minimized.
• Add customizable borders/gaps between split terminal panes in COSMIC Terminal.
• Fix VPN connection fail.
• Fix mouse pointer issue when using lan-mouse, software sharing mouse & keyboard between different computers.

For more about the release as well as the source tarball, see the Github releases page.

Get COSMIC Desktop 1.5.0

Fedora Rawhide and Arch Linux have already made the new desktop release into system repositories. And, Ubuntu user may keep an eye on this unofficial PPA that contains the desktop packages for 26.04 LTS.

For other Linux, go check this page to see if the COSMIC desktop is available in your Linux Distribution.

source https://ubuntuhandbook.org/index.php/2026/07/cosmic-1-5-0-released-with-improved-multi-monitor-hybrid-gpu-support/