KDE Plasma users face a dire omen of change: 6.6.6 arrives

os platforms

6.7 is now current, and in 6.8 you're getting Wayland whether you like it or not

KDE Plasma 6.6.6 is here, along with a beastly long list of bugfixes, so if you have Plasma 6.6.5 – for instance, if you are using KDE on FreeBSD 15.1 – then it's an update well worth having.

KDE Plasma 6.6.6 is a release that really is just about bug-fixes, but while there are no headline-grabbing features coming out for this inauspicious version number, it's worth remembering: in a world of bloated code, real-world software still depends on experienced maintainers.

If you really like Plasma 6.6, you should hope that version 6.6.6* lasts longer than Linux kernel 6.6.6 did – that was only around for a couple of days before it was replaced with Linux 6.6.7.

This version appeared precisely on schedule, but that planned release timetable holds some bad news. Under the heading Bugfix releases, it says:

“Beginning with Plasma 6.3, stable 'feature' releases will each receive six (6) subsequent updates containing bug fixes.”

If the developers hold to that, this is the last release of the Plasma 6.6 series. The main focus of the team’s efforts has already moved to Plasma 6.7, which was released in the middle of June.

We suspect that will matter more, because as we reported last month, the plan is that Plasma 6.7 will be the last version to support an X11 session. KDE Plasma 6.8 is currently scheduled for mid-October, in order to coincide with the 30th anniversary of the announcement of the “Kool Desktop Environment”. The plan is still as it was in 2025: Plasma 6.8 will be Wayland-only. Already today, the default setup of Plasma 6.7 on most OSes uses Wayland, but it’s still possible to install the necessary package and have the option of running Plasma using X11 instead.

For an in-depth look at why you might want that, see Dedoimedo’s review of Kubuntu 26.04. For instance, at login, Plasma can optionally re-open all the windows you had last time. Wayland, by design, blocks the window manager from restoring window sizes and positions: they’ll all open heaped on top of one another, in the centre of the screen.

Although it was two years ago now, digital artist David Revoy explained in great depth how KDE 5 on X11 had very much better hardware support than KDE 6 on Wayland. It remains the best such comparison we’ve seen.

We’re waiting with interest to see if there’s enough of a Wayland resistance to help the recently announced Sonic Desktop Environment thrive. It’s a fork of current KDE Plasma, aimed at keeping X11 support. There definitely is still life in X11 – just over a year ago, we reported on the new XLibre fork of the X.org server, and since then, the project has published no less than 27 releases. ®

*Bootnote
As some will note, in the Christian Bible, 666 is the “Number of the Beast” – although in the oldest known version of the Book of Revelations, the Oxyrhynchus Papyri, page 115 says that the number is 616. Maybe all the fuss is just over a typo anyway.