Linux Lite 7.6 is the latest, slightly updated release of this technologically moderate distro from New Zealand.
Linux Lite 7.6 leaves the core Ubuntu 24.04.3 OS largely untouched, but selectively updates the supplied software collection. With good documentation, lots of helpful tweaks, and blissfully free of both Snap and Flatpak, there's a lot to like.
Linux Lite 7.6, with its Welcome app and the Start menu open. No mess, no fuss, no nonsense
We reviewed Linux Lite 7.0 back in June 2024, and this version isn't massively different. It's based on Ubuntu 24.04.3, the third update for the latest LTS version that came out last July, and mostly the new version of Linux Lite leaves that core OS well alone. It still uses kernel 6.8, the same that Ubuntu shipped with last year, and retains the same version of the same desktop, Xfce 4.18, which came out at the end of 2022. As Bert Lance said: "If it ain't broke, don't fix it."
The more visible components that you actually work with have been updated, though. For instance, it has the latest LibreOffice 25.8 and Google Chrome 140. It does still supply some older releases of other things, though, such as Thunderbird 128 and GIMP 2.10.
Xfce is the only desktop on offer, but it's a solid choice. It's been configured with a conventional-style taskbar at the bottom, and it comes with replacement themes, including icons and wallpapers and a choice of light or dark mode. We often read criticisms of Xfce's dowdy looks, but here it looks fresh and modern (and flat, of which we're less fond). As ever, it comes with a wide range of small accessories and tools to make life easier, which even extends to a snazzy bash shell prompt.
New for this release is a documentation wiki, which has extensive instructions to help new users navigate the system. We especially appreciate helpful advice, such as how to disable Secure Boot. The main wiki page contains a lot of different info, all squeezed together onto one page, and we feel more organization would help – but even so, it's much better than what most distros provide.
Another thing we suspect many will like is that neither Snap nor Flatpak are installed. There is, however, the Lite Software tool, which has a curated list of useful extras, from Audacity to Zoom.
The built-in Software Store mixes FOSS and proprietary freeware, but it has all the essentials
When we first looked at Linux Lite 6.0 over three years ago, we commented that it was pretty solid but not notably lightweight. Times have changed, mostly for the worse, and these days its 3.18 GB download is relatively modest. It's about half the size of Ubuntu 25.04, which we described as a pudgy puffin, and a gigabyte smaller than Xubuntu. It takes about 12 GB of disk space, which isn't sleek but isn't that bad for 2025, and still only uses about 850 MB of RAM at idle, which is good going by contemporary standards.
Its biggest limitation is that the distro still does not support version-to-version upgrades. Older releases of Linux Lite 7.x can upgrade to this one, but not from 6.x. This used to be true of some other Ubuntu-based distros, but Linux Mint added an upgrade tool years ago, and Zorin OS 16.3 gained one back in 2023. This is a key weakness, which the distro maintainers need to fix. However, as Windows replacements for Linux newbies go, this is an excellent choice. ®
Source: The register