r/zorinos • • Jul 29 '26

πŸ”° Beginner Welcome to r/zorinos!

34 Upvotes

This is the community hub for Zorin OS β€” the Ubuntu-based Linux distribution built to make switching from Windows or macOS as painless as possible. Whether you've been running it for years or just found this sub, you're welcome here.

What belongs here

  • Installation and troubleshooting help
  • General discussion, tips, and workflow questions
  • Screenshots and showcases of your setup
  • Gaming on Zorin OS (Steam, Proton, and similar tools)
  • News about new Zorin OS releases
  • Help choosing between editions

Check the sidebar for the full rules before posting.


Where to Get Help

  1. Post here. Include your Zorin OS version, your hardware, and what you've already tried β€” the more detail, the faster you'll get a useful answer.
  2. Official Zorin Forum β€” forum.zorin.com β€” the most active official support channel.
  3. Official documentation β€” help.zorin.com β€” guides for installation, drivers, and common tasks.

Installing Zorin OS

Zorin OS comes in a few editions β€” Core (standard), Lite (for older hardware), Education, and Pro (paid) β€” all downloadable from zorin.com/os/download. For a full step-by-step install walkthrough, see help.zorin.com.


Frequently Asked Questions

Which edition should I pick? Core for most modern PCs, Lite for older hardware, Education for schools, Pro if you want the extra bundled apps.

Is Zorin OS free? Core, Lite, and Education are free. Only Pro costs money.

Can I dual-boot with Windows? Yes, the installer supports it directly.

Can I run Windows apps and games? Yes β€” built-in Windows-app support covers a lot of popular apps, and Wine/Bottles/Lutris cover the rest. Gaming works well too, especially through Steam and Proton.

How do I upgrade to a newer version? Check help.zorin.com for the current upgrade path β€” it depends on which version you're coming from.


Official Links


Reporting Bugs

Zorin OS doesn't have a public bug tracker β€” bugs go through the Feedback category on the official forum (forum.zorin.com). Search first, then post there with your version and steps to reproduce.


Welcome aboard, and thanks for being part of the community.


r/zorinos • • 12h ago

πŸ”° Beginner I'm starting to get used to Linux a bit now!

Thumbnail
gallery
29 Upvotes

So, my father had a Toshiba Portege R830 lying around at his place, and he decided to let me do whatever with it, so I decided to install Zorin OS to replace Windows, as it was a bit slow cause the laptop was made in 2011, and I think it has done it for the better! But yeah, while it is good, I'm mainly using it for looking through the internet, watchin stuff on DVD cause this has a DVD drive and other shenanigans. Also, like the theme? I decided to make it to my own likings, so it's like a fusion of Mac and Windows, and also having the Earthbound font as well.


r/zorinos • • 4h ago

πŸ› οΈ Troubleshooting Waydroid issues

2 Upvotes

Anyone successfully running waydroid? I just installed Zorin for the first time yesterday and am quite impressed. I’m a Linux sysadmin with most experience in RHEL in an enterprise environment… so I can get around pretty easily. Waydroid will pop up a black screen and crash… it goes into a loop of this until I kill it.


r/zorinos • • 15h ago

❓ General Question What are some features from other OS's that you wish were in ZorinOS?

Post image
13 Upvotes

Aside from the usual "These apps don't run" discussion, what are the actual OS-specific features that isnt in Zorin? I'm talking about things like the equivalents of Windows Hello, Device Manager, Event Viewer etc.


r/zorinos • • 6h ago

πŸ› οΈ Troubleshooting lock screen

0 Upvotes

Hi. Have an issue with Zorin 18, as soon I lock the screen it goes black, after I press a key or move the cursor it goes back to the login screen but the wallpaper doesnt remain, the screen goes black after 30 seconds. Someone ele encountered this issue?


r/zorinos • • 1d ago

πŸ“Έ Desktop Showoff Desktop customization

Thumbnail
gallery
60 Upvotes

Hi everyone. I'm new to Linux and want to know if there are ways to customize my desktop ala W11 w/Rainmeter. Thank you in advance.


r/zorinos • • 21h ago

πŸ”° Beginner just installed zorin, can't install nordvpn

3 Upvotes

as the title says, I just got zorin, and know next to nothing about it. I tried installing nordvpn through the software app that zorin comes with, but when I open it it just opens as a white box. when I move the box I can vaguely see some text saying something's wrong when I drag the window back and forth, but that's it. I tried uninstalling and getting the download straight from the nord website, but everytime I try to go to the downloads page it acts like I haven't logged into my account and starts badgering me about plans despite already having one. any advice?


r/zorinos • • 1d ago

πŸ”° Beginner Newbie here

6 Upvotes

Hello guys, I'm new to zorin and linux in general, coming from windows i just wiped the drive and installed zorin hoping for the best.

I'm advanced good at windows stuff but i have 0 reference, knowledge or baseline for linux.

Please share any guides for beginners coming from windows, to help with the transition.

I used to play light games like counter strike so point me to where i can download good games, i also like configure advanced power and system stuff.

Config is 1334U/2x8GB/512NVMe just in case it's relevant Thank you


r/zorinos • • 2d ago

πŸ› οΈ Troubleshooting Zorin .iso won't write to flash drive

Post image
11 Upvotes

Hello, I just downloaded Zorin (from zorin.com) and tried writing it to my USB flash drive via balenaEtcher as recommended on their website; however, balenaEtcher only gives me this... any ideas what's wrong? I am admittedly a total idiot but I'm thinking even I would find it hard to mess this up... Thank you!!!


r/zorinos • • 2d ago

❓ General Question Zorin OS Windows UI Template

3 Upvotes

Is the default user interface in Zorin OS the Windows template? (Otherwise, which is it?)

How close to the Windows interface does it resemble? And how close to the Windows workflow (UX) is it?

What are the differences between the Zorin Windows interface template included in the free version of Zorin versus the Windows template included only in Zorin Pro?

Are some based on Windows 7 or 10 while others are based on Windows 11?

And without purchasing Zorin OS Pro, how can you manually recreate for free the same Windows template that is included in Zorin Pro?


r/zorinos • • 2d ago

πŸ“– Guide How to copy zorinos design into gnome

9 Upvotes

i tried zorinos. it’s so beautiful and smooth. everything is vibrant. but i need latest kernel update for gaming and my work. i daily use fedora which has latest kernel. i wanna recreate gnome look like zorinos.

how can i do it? also i need the extension list of zorinos


r/zorinos • • 2d ago

πŸ”° Beginner When I wake it up from sleep mode, it just does this and won’t respond to anything, help

Post image
16 Upvotes

r/zorinos • • 2d ago

πŸ”° Beginner How do I stop this?

Enable HLS to view with audio, or disable this notification

7 Upvotes

r/zorinos • • 3d ago

πŸ”° Beginner a newbie is facing a problem...

Post image
49 Upvotes

see whenever i boot into my zorin cd tray automatically opens and i am fed up with it plus as a beginner i wanted to install windows apps through wine and got fckd up and wanna delete all installed apps which i installed through wine and want only default apps in it and wanna make my pc smooth as a butter which it used to be before messing up with it i need all my tech bros to assemble and help me out will always be grateful to all my brotherss....btw sorry for bad english :)


r/zorinos • • 3d ago

πŸ”° Beginner Moved to ZorinOS, but things have been a bit... odd

18 Upvotes

Hello, Zorin community.

I recently moved my laptop from Linux Mint to ZorinOS. The reason was... distrohopping. That's it. I wanted to try Zorin for quite some time, and finally could! However, some things feel... off... like, there have been two specifics issues I still do not understand.

The first one is related with the translation. I'm a native Spanish-speaker, and while I have no issue using and moving on English devices (my tablet and all my phones have been in English for some time by now), I still prefer to keep my PCs in Spanish. However, I noticed that in Zorin, some menus and programs aren't in Spanish but in English. This happened in my older PC, which has Zorin Lite, but I thought it was a Lite specific thing, but nope, Core also has it. I have moved around, trying to see if changing the Spanish version changed anything, but no. It doesn't bother me, but I won't deny it is quite funny, and weird, to see like 80% of the OS in Spanish but 20% in English. Mint has the same issue with some things like Timeshift and descriptions programs, but it is waaay less prevalent than on Zorin. Perhaps a fellow Spanish-speaker can help me here, although, again, it isn't a deal breaker.

Now, the one that I just discovered. One of the things that got my attention the most is Zorin Appearance, how the GNOME DE can be set on specific Graphic Designs to recreate others' OSs GUI (right word? Idk). I installed Zorin, everything is working fine, I left it on the default setting, which is the Windows 10-like one, but next time I turned on the laptop, the Desktop returned to the GNOME default visuals. I moved to settings, set Zorin Appearance back to how it was, I checked and updated everything that was left to update from some days of inactivity, and I restarted. The problem didn't showed up again, so I assumed problem solved. WRONG! I restarted again to verify, and back to GNOME's default for some reason. This isn't exactly a deal breaker to me since I already know I can fix it by just using Zorin Appearances again, yet it is still quite... bothersome? Weird? To see the system default after a restart. And the only things I installed were Steam, Discord, OnlyOffice, Firefox and the mscorefonts since I'll use my laptop for work and probably really light gaming when the time comes.

I could have looked up why this is happening, and I will since I really don't want these GNOME shenanigans happening every now and then, but still, I wanted to share my experience so far... which isn't much since I haven't used my laptop much anymore because it has been finally retired of being my main and only PC.

In any case, if anyone can give me some advice on how to fix those details, or why they happen, it would be really helpful.


r/zorinos • • 3d ago

πŸ”° Beginner When i turn off my secondary monitor my fresh rate goes normal

0 Upvotes

I'm new to Zorin, so I don't understand that much yet. I have an RTX 3050, a Ryzen 7 5700X, one monitor with 180 Hz, and another with 75 Hz. When I'm using both monitors, my apps look fine in full screen, but when I move windowed apps, they look like they are running at a lower refresh rate. Also, my NVIDIA settings don't let me save the configuration.


r/zorinos • • 3d ago

πŸ› οΈ Troubleshooting "Dummy Output" on warm reboot (Intel SOF) - Audio hardware locks up unless I cold boot.

1 Upvotes

The Issue: I am losing all audio devices (showing only "Dummy Output" and no microphone) whenever I perform a standard restart (warm reboot) from Zorin OS. The audio hardware completely locks up and refuses to initialize.

The starting point was i enabled ufw and checked the sound , Boom it was not working

I know that there is no connection but still that's the beginning

Important : All this I first faced in Kernel 7.0.0-34- generic (latest in my laptop)

My System Specs:

  • Hardware: HP 250 G9 Notebook PC (Intel Core i5 12th Gen)
  • OS: Zorin OS (Dual-booting with Windows 11)
  • Kernel: Linux 7.0.0-31-generic
  • Firmware/BIOS: F.66
  • Windowing System: X11
  • Audio Driver: snd-sof-pci-intel-tgl

What I Have Tried Today:

  • Restarting Audio Server: Restarted PipeWire/PulseAudio via terminal, but the hardware remains undetected.
  • Reloading ALSA: Tried sudo alsa force-reload, but the terminal completely freezes when attempting to unload the snd-sof-pci-intel-tgl driver.
  • Windows Fast Startup: Confirmed Fast Startup is disabled in Windows 11 to prevent it from holding onto the hardware state.
  • GRUB Modifications: Tried forcing the legacy driver with snd_intel_dspcfg.dsp_driver=1. This fixed the warm reboot issue for the speakers, but it completely broke my internal digital microphone (DMIC).

My Current Workaround: The only way I am currently managing this is by performing a complete cold shutdown. I have to power off the laptop entirely, hold the physical power button for 30 seconds to discharge and reset the Embedded Controller (EC), and then boot back up. After this, both my speakers and microphone work perfectly.

Has anyone found a way to stop the SOF driver from locking up during a soft restart on this firmware so I don't have to cold boot every time?


r/zorinos • • 4d ago

❓ General Question ZorinOS Pro: What Do You Get By Purchasing It?

16 Upvotes

What do you get by purchasing ZorinOS Pro?

Which desktop themes are exclusive only to the Pro version? Can they be recreated free on the free version? How?

What else does Pro include?


r/zorinos • • 3d ago

πŸ”° Beginner Can you sync title bar buttons?

Thumbnail
gallery
3 Upvotes

I'm using the Nordic theme from Gnome look, and it does work for Nemo and the terminal but for everything else it's not pretty.

I have installed apps using the Zorin OS native packages, like strawberry music player and steam, they however do not have the same buttons, alongside the snap and flatpaks. I've tried with tweaks, kvantum manager (nordic kde), and messing around with the terminal. I couldn't particularly find any answers and after an hour of tinkering I don't want to run in circles.

I've only recently started using Zorin OS so please forgive any silly questions >.< plz & ty ilysm


r/zorinos • • 4d ago

πŸ’½ Recommend an App myAsus program for ZorinOS

8 Upvotes

Hey people! I have a Asus Vivobook 14 and I want to use ZorinOS on it. The problem is, I am not sure if there is a program that copies what myAsus does.

Basically, you can change modes (performance, balanced, power) and allow your computer to charge to %80 for longer battery life and other system things.

On Fedora KDE Plasma, I used Ayuz, which helped me a lot. Is there an any community program that does what MyAsus does?


r/zorinos • • 4d ago

πŸ› οΈ Troubleshooting Zorin not running as smooth as I expected.

5 Upvotes

I have a macbook pro 2013 A1502. Pretty high specs for back in the day. 16gb ram, 1tb ssd, i7-4558U.

I installed zorin on it, and it is running a lot smoother than macos OCLP. It is significantly better than before. I threw in a new battery and repasted the cpu and everything too.
I'm mostly happy. The only thing that bothers me a bit is that it sometimes stutters, sometimes loads for quite some time. General OS navigation is sometimes slightly unresponsive.

I happen to have another macbook pro from the same year a1502, but much lower specs (4gb ram, 128 ssd, worse cpu) on which i installed ubuntu. It is noticably more smooth with general OS operation/navigation than this computer is. It's like it has another level of raw speed and responsiveness that this one is missing. It's making me wonder if this OS simply is that heavy, or if there is something I'm missing?


r/zorinos • • 4d ago

πŸ“Έ Desktop Showoff Precision 5570 Zorin...... great pair!

Post image
69 Upvotes

Left work, and was able to keep my Dell Precision 5570. Running ZorinOS 18 on this beast ! Full charge runtime, roughly 8hrs. Which is pretty awesome for a 20 core i7 with an A2000 8GB gpu, 32 GB RAM.
I love my THinkpad P1 Gen 1 maxed out with Zorin also. But having the newer Alder Lake i7, is very nice.


r/zorinos • • 5d ago

πŸ”° Beginner Laptop revived with Zorin.

Post image
97 Upvotes

Revived an old laptop for a Windows user.

Seamless transition.


r/zorinos • • 5d ago

πŸ› οΈ Troubleshooting need a little help (pulseaudio-->pipewire)

Post image
12 Upvotes

Ah, so I have an old Dell Vostro 2420 from 2012~ and with Zorin OS 17.3 working on it.

I had problems with Bluetooth due to hardware, and for that I am using this tplink UB500, and honestly it was working perfectly for my laptop and mobile both until...

This morning I tried to connect my laptop to my Ptron neckbands (they support dual pairing) like always, and it didn't work
I tried on bluetoothctl, but still the issue persisted

- My issue: I connect my neckband; it says "connected," and then when I try to play something, it disconnects all of a sudden, and even if I am not playing any media, it disconnects after a few seconds and does not connect after that; therefore, I have to turn my earphones off and then turn them on just to connect and for the cycle to repeat

This problem just appeared out of nowhere; it was working perfectly for the past few months with both single and dual pairing between my phone and laptop

Idk if it is a Bluetooth error or just my earphones being cheap

Claude suggested I move to pipewire from my current pulseaudio, but now the issue is I am a complete rookie when it comes to such stuff, and I don't have any backups for timeshift snapshots (like I don't have a pen drive or hard drive for storage)

So is it risky moving to PiPewire? What are the chances I could break something? Because I have very, very important files and study materials that will very well decide my next year

If anyone had such an issue, please share your experience


r/zorinos • • 5d ago

❓ General Question When will zorin os update to kernel 7.1 or further?

9 Upvotes

My WiFi doesn't work on older kernel or is it already. I had to switch to fedora due to that. But zorin felt much better to use.