If you've been following the scene for a while Linux on mobile devicesYou've probably heard of names like PinePhone, Librem 5, postmarketOS, or Ubuntu Touch. Within this ecosystem, two key players have been gaining strength: GNOME Mobile (GNOME Shell on mobile devices) and Phoshwhich represent two closely related ways of bringing the GNOME experience into your pocket.
The curious thing is that, although many people have heard of “GNOME on mobile” Through forums, social media, or videos, almost no one has seen it advertised on TV or in mass marketing campaigns. For many, the idea boils down to "having something like Ubuntu or GNOME on your computer, but on your phone," and the logical question is whether it actually behaves like the desktop GNOME or if we're talking about a different experience, more similar to Android or iOS.
The challenge of bringing Linux to mobile today
As of today, assembling Linux on a smartphone It remains a minor odyssey. The proposals are still in their infancy, hardware manufacturers aren't making things easy, and the enormous variety of ARM processors makes it extremely difficult to achieve solid and consistent support for every mobile phone, modem, camera, or sensor already on the market.
If you take a look at the postmarketOS wikiYou'll see a very long list of models under review, but very few fall into the category of devices fully recommended for daily use. The number of phones where you can install a GNU/Linux mobile system And using it without serious problems is still limited, although things improve a little each year.
Meanwhile, many users are approaching the GNOME mobile experience right from the desktop. Thanks to GNOME's focus on a responsive interface, it's possible to "simulate" how many of its applications would look on a phone simply by resizing the window until it's narrow, as if it were a vertical screen.
GNOME and its commitment to a responsive interface
GNOME's official strategy is quite clear: Standard interface must be adapted seamlessly transition to smaller screens, without maintaining a completely separate desktop and mobile shell. In other words, the same GNOME Shell base should be able to function on both a large monitor and a 6-inch panel.
This approach is supported by the Minimalist GNOME design, in its large empty areas and intensive use of gestures and panels. When you shrink an app window like Settings, Files, Maps, or GNOME Web, the interface reorganizes menus, sidebars, and buttons, leaving a layout very similar to what you'd see on a mobile device.
This responsive behavior allows many GNOME applications to offer a clean mobile interfaceWith swipeable side menus and bottom navigation bars, all without maintaining separate code branches for desktop and phone. The result is a consistent experience across all screen sizes and less duplicate work for developers.
In this context, Flathub is emerging as a kind of universal app store for both desktop and Linux-based mobile devices. There are already applications that are born directly with the mobile-first philosophy, such as Portfolio (a lightweight file explorer designed for small screens) or Iotas (a very simple, touch-enabled notepad), in addition to many classic GNOME apps that are being adapted.
GNOME Mobile: from GNOME 40 to the “shell on mobile”
Although the official announcements do not literally mention “GNOME Mobile” As a finished product, the project is usually described as "GNOME Shell on mobile." That is, it's not a completely new environment, but rather a thorough adaptation of the familiar shell to work seamlessly on phones and tablets.
The idea began to take shape with GNOME 40This was when the design team worked with experimental concepts to improve compatibility with touchscreens and small displays. Key ideas emerged from this process, such as the horizontal app grid, pagination, drag-and-drop folders, and realigned workspaces to better utilize the vertical format.
Jonas Dressler, one of the developers involved, commented that "GNOME Shell won't be long before it works on phones, although not perfectly."This means that a good part of the foundation is already in place, but there are still layers of functionality typical of smartphones (calls, locking, etc.) that are outside the direct scope of the GNOME project and require more system-level integration work.
Roadmap and planned features for GNOME Shell for mobile
The project documentation and blogs detail a rather ambitious roadmap for the mobile version of GNOME ShellSome parts are already implemented, others are under development, and others are only in the design phase:
- New gesture API and screen size detection: already available, designed to distinguish between desktop, tablet or mobile and react with specific gestures.
- Top and bottom panel layers: a design that is somewhat reminiscent of Phosh, with an area for notifications, system status and gestures from below to switch apps or show the grid.
- Workspaces and multitasking: adaptation of GNOME workspaces so that each full-screen app occupies its own space, something more intuitive on mobile.
- Adaptable application grid: with pagination, folders and layout designed for narrow screens, inherited from the changes incorporated with GNOME 40.
- On-screen keyboard: still in progress, but essential for pure touch use, with the idea of offering a more polished experience than the current one.
- Quick settings and notifications Redesigned: quick controls for WiFi, data, flashlight, etc., plus a more practical vertical notification system.
Beyond these points, the GNOME team is also working on things like basic shell navigation (gestures to go to Activities, switch apps, show grid), app launching, integrated search, and a more complete touch keyboard.
The work has been accelerated thanks to funding from Prototype FundA German program that supports software of public interest. Even so, Dressler himself admits that this support is not enough to make GNOME Shell a system 100% suitable for use as a primary phone: additional features such as calls from the lock screen, PIN entry, emergency calls, convenient access to the flashlight, and other everyday functions that users depend on would be needed.
Mobile shell, Libhandy, Libadwaita and the road to convergence
Alongside the work on the shell, the GNOME app ecosystem has been adopting libraries such as Libhandy and later Libadwaitadesigned so that interfaces adapt smoothly to different sizes without rewriting the applications.
Within GitLab, GNOME maintains the set of designs and concepts under the label “Mobile shell”There we can see very experimental mockups ranging from the app launcher to the touch keyboard, including new structures for the shell and the multitasking area.
These designs aren't a firm promise that we'll see exactly that interface in future versions, but they do show the medium and long term directionSome internal sources suggest that the complete transition could take years and materialize in a major evolution of the environment (at one point there was talk of a hypothetical GNOME 4), but the intention to move towards real convergence is clear.
Key applications geared towards mobile use
For GNOME to make sense on a mobile device, it's not enough to simply adapt the shell; other things are needed. applications designed for touch useImportant steps have been taken here:
On the one hand, they have managed to launch GNOME Camera In devices like the PinePhone Pro, taking advantage of the drivers included in kernel 6.3, libcamera and PipeWire. Although the image quality is still far from that of the most popular commercial mobile phones, it is a clear indication that the camera stack is maturing.
More recently, GNOME has released SnapshotIt's a camera app designed to capture photos and video not only on computers, but also on tablets and phones. Its slogan is something like "capture images and video on your computer, tablet, and phone," and its interface is quite reminiscent of Google Pixel or iPhone: clean, straightforward, and fully touch-based.
Snapshot has entered the GNOME “incubator” Still in a fairly basic stage (currently offering a timer and little else), it makes it clear that the camera is a central element in its mobile strategy. The idea is that it will gain features as it's tested on more devices and the performance and compatibility details with common hardware are refined.
Phosh: the other major protagonist of GNOME Mobile
While GNOME Shell was taking steps towards convergence, Purism created Phosh (Phone Shell)Phosh, a lightweight, touch-sensitive graphical shell designed from the outset for the Librem 5. Over time, Phosh has ceased to be exclusive to that phone and has become one of the central pieces of the mobile Linux ecosystem.
Phosh is based on GNOME technologies and on GTK + 3It relies on its own compositor called Phoc, which runs on Wayland. Unlike other, more resource-intensive compositors, Phoc has fairly modest hardware requirements, which helps GTK+3 and GNOME apps run smoothly without the need for complicated tweaks.
In addition to the shell and the composer, Phosh is completed with an integrated session (phosh.sessionThis launches Phosh, Phoc, and the necessary GNOME components, along with a dedicated on-screen keyboard, initially phosh-osk-stub (now renamed Stevia). For text input, many systems use Squeekboarddesigned specifically for touch devices.
Where Phosph is used and its role in the ecosystem
Over time, Phosh has moved away from PureOS and the Librem 5 to become part of multiple mobile distributionsToday we find it in postmarketOS, Mobian, Droidian, some images for Pine64 devices and specific editions like Fedora for smartphones.
Projects like KDE with Plasma MobileUBports with Lomiri or individual initiatives like JingOS and CDE coexist in the same space, but the general perception is that Phosh is the one that works best today in real-world environments, especially in terms of stability, usability, and community support.
In fact, even distributions traditionally designed for advanced users have embraced Phosh. In Arch Linux, for example, a developer from both the distribution itself and Red Hat packaged Phosh for ArchThis allows any user with some experience in systems management to set up a mobile or touch environment on the minimalist Arch base, installing only what they really need.
Advantages of Phosh: interface and optimization for mobile hardware
Phosh offers a interface highly oriented towards touchscreensIt features gesture navigation, a simple application launcher, and a side or top panel for accessing critical system functions. It doesn't attempt to mimic a classic desktop, but rather offers an experience similar to that of a modern smartphone, yet with the GNU/Linux philosophy underpinning it.
Among its strengths are the optimization for modest hardware, low resource consumption and fairly reasonable battery management, something vital for devices like the Librem 5 or the PinePhone to function as real mobile phones without being glued to the charger.
Phosh maintains some minimum CPU and RAM requirements This allows it to run on phones and tablets with limited specifications, while supporting basic multitasking and smooth app switching. The focus is on delivering a decent experience even when the hardware falls short of typical Android flagships.
Security also plays a role: Phosh relies on Wayland as a graphics serverThis reduces certain attack surfaces associated with X11 and better fits the isolation needs of a mobile device.
Recent updates to Phosh 0.48
Phosh's development continues to progress at a good pace. In version Phosh 0.48 Significant changes have been introduced in both the shell and adjacent technologies:
- Un new screensaver add-on which allows you to control multimedia playback using the MPRIS protocol, useful for managing music or podcasts from the lock screen.
- possibility of writing plugins in ValaThis opens the door to more sophisticated extensions developed in this language, which is close to the GNOME ecosystem.
- Default activation of cell diffusion dialog box, displaying broadcast messages from the operator, such as emergency alerts or local information.
- A panel has been added to phosh-mobile-settings for configure broadcast message categoriesas well as to adjust which system notification categories are displayed and whether or not the keyboard indicator is shown on the panel.
In the Phoc composer, the recent version has switched to using wlroots 0.19.0Adding compatibility with modern Wayland protocols such as shortcuts-inhibit (for managing keyboard shortcuts), ext-image-capture-source-v1 and ext-image-capture-copy-v1 (aimed at capturing screen content), as well as improving integration with wp_presentation_time_v2.
Support has also been implemented for adaptive refresh rate of the monitor (adaptive-sync), which helps optimize fluidity and power consumption, and it is now possible to save and restore the settings of the video outputs.
In parallel, the gmobile project, which brings together drivers to run GNOME on mobile devicesIt has added support for the power button on mobile phones such as the Fairphone 5 and FuriPhone FLX1, as well as allowing the conversion of MCC country codes to ISO format, useful for handling mobile network information.
The on-screen keyboard phosh-osk-stub has been renamed Stevia and has incorporated a “us+dvorak” distribution. In addition, multiple dependencies have been updated: GNOME 48, Calls 48.2, cellbroadcastd 0.0.2, feedbackd 0.8.3, feedbackd-device-themes 0.8.4, callaudiod 0.1.10, wys 0.1.12 and mmsd-tng 2.6.3, aligning the Phosh stack with modern versions of the GNOME and telephony ecosystem.
Phosh on Arch Linux: minimalist base, modern mobile shell
Arch Linux has always been characterized by offering a very minimal base systemWith few pre-installed packages and complete freedom for the user to add only what they need, Arch, unlike distributions such as Ubuntu or Fedora, which come with default software packages, prioritizes leaving that task to the user.
This fits very well with the spirit of Phosh: you can start from a Arch completely peeled and then build on top of that the mobile environment you want, whether it's Phosh, Plasma Mobile or another interface, by installing the packages from the official repositories.
In Arch, Phosh is installed via pacmanAdding the corresponding package and, if desired, complementing it with extras such as virtual keyboards (for example, Squeekboard) or touch-enabled apps. Then, a Wayland session entry is created for Phosh, so that in the login manager you can choose "Phosh" as your graphical shell and start your touch session on Arch.
However, it is assumed that the user has basic knowledge of Linux system administrationBecause correctly configuring drivers, Wayland, touch input, and other components is not trivial for beginners. It's an ideal approach for professionals or advanced enthusiasts who want a fully customized mobile platform.
Other desktop projects in the mobile race
GNOME and Phosh are not alone in this adventure. KDE with Plasma Mobile UBports has been pushing its own vision of a converged interface for years, present in devices like PinePhone and ARM distributions like Manjaro. UBports maintains lomiri for Ubuntu Touch, while proposals such as JingOS or CDE have joined the party at different times.
The launch of Fedora 38 with Fedora MobilityRecent discussions about GNOME on mobile devices and its work with postmarketOS and the Librem 5 suggest that major Linux desktop environments are no longer hiding their aspirations to reach phones and tablets. The one piece that still feels out of place in GNOME is Mutter, the compositor, which needs further refinement to better adapt to these form factors and coexist (or compete) with what Phosh already offers.
Final considerations
In any case, the GNOME application ecosystem seems to be one step ahead: many are already adopting design guidelines for small screens, which serves as the perfect testing ground on the desktop while mobile shells finish maturing.
Given all of the above, the current situation of GNOME Mobile and Phosph It is that of an ecosystem in full bloom: GNOME Shell is consolidating its path towards convergence with gesture APIs, adaptive layouts and apps like Snapshot or GNOME Camera; Phosh, for its part, has become the practical "workhorse" in Librem 5, PinePhone, postmarketOS, Mobian, Arch and company, with active development (Phosh 0.48, Phoc + wlroots 0.19, gmobile, Stevia) that keeps it at the forefront of touch Linux.
Although no one dares to give exact dates for having "the perfect Linux mobile" ready for calls, a high-quality camera, and conveniences on par with Android or iOS, the general feeling is that each new advance—from GNOME's touch panels to broadcast messages in Phosh—brings the real possibility of using a GNU/Linux smartphone as the main device a little closer for those willing to sacrifice some convenience in exchange for control, privacy, and freedom.