Ubuntu Touch will be available as an alternative OS

Apr 24, 2018 15:00 GMT  ·  By

​Purism​, the makers of high-quality and privacy-focused laptops, announced today a partnership with ​UBports Foundation to offer the Ubuntu Touch mobile operating system on the upcoming Librem 5 Linux phone.

Lead by talented Linux developer Marius Gripsgard, the UBports Foundation keeps the Ubuntu Touch mobile OS developed by Canonical, the company behind the widely-used Ubuntu Linux operating system, alive for various popular smartphones, including Fairphone 2, Nexus 5, OnePlus One, as well as the BQ Aquaris M10 FHD tablet that was designed to run Ubuntu Touch in the first place.

Now, Purism and UBports are partnering to offer the Ubuntu Touch mobile operating system on the upcoming Librem 5 Linux phone, which raised more than $2 million last fall​, promising to be the privacy and security-focused smartphone you've been expecting for a long time. While not the default OS, users will be able to easily run Ubuntu Touch on the Librem 5 phone.

"Having Ubuntu Touch working by default on a mobile phone such as the Librem 5 is an ideal approach to offer ease-of-use to people while increasing our install base," said Marius Gripsgard, Founder of UBports. "Partnering with Purism will allow us to advance UBports for well supported commercial devices for the first time. The Librem 5 will be the ideal hardware for Ubuntu Touch, particularly as it will not require an Android subsystem."

Librem 5 arriving January 2019 with three mobile OSes

When it's out, Librem 5 might be the only smartphone on the market that can run no less than three entirely free and open source mobile operating systems. These include the Debian-based PureOS running a variant of the GNOME desktop environment, which will be the default operating system on the Librem 5, PureOS with the KDE Plasma Mobile interface, and Ubuntu Touch developed by UBports.

As mentioned before, Ubuntu Touch will be available as a supported mobile operating system on ​Purism’s upcoming Librem 5 Linux smartphone​, which is scheduled to hit the streets in early 2019. With early access to the Librem 5 development boards, UBports will be able to tightly integrate Ubuntu Touch and its native apps with Librem 5's hardware.

"Having Ubuntu Touch shed Android entirely and utilize our hardware is a win for users," said Todd Weaver, CEO of Purism. "While we develop, support, and recommend PureOS, allowing an alternative to users that is supported by Purism can only help the cause of improving digital rights for users."

With that in mind, Librem 5 will probably become the new Ubuntu Phone you've always wanted and which Canonical failed to keep alive. Below, you can check out a render showing off the Ubuntu Touch mobile operating system running on the Librem 5 Linux phone, which was provided to Softpedia News by Purism and UBports.

Librem 5 running Ubuntu Touch
Librem 5 running Ubuntu Touch