Ubuntu 25.04 is Now Available with ARM64 and BitLocker Support

Ubuntu 25.04 “Plucky Puffin” is now available, with Linux kernel 6.14, GNOME 48, and an improved installer and boot experience. There’s also some interesting news for fans of Arm PCs.

“Plucky Puffin combines the very latest in open source desktop technology with a focus on making high quality developer tooling readily available on Ubuntu,” Ubuntu vice president Jon Seager says. “Ubuntu 25.04 delivers performance improvements across Intel GPUs, and a new purpose-built ISO for ARM64 hardware enthusiasts. Our increasing support for confidential computing with AMD SEV-SNP makes Ubuntu the target platform to deploy AI workloads securely and at scale on both public clouds and private data centers”

Here are some of the key new features in this release.

Linux kernel 6.14. This version of the Linux kernel brings an improved scheduler and other new features.

GNOME 48. The latest version of the default Ubuntu desktop environment gets a Preserve Battery Health mode, a Wellbeing panel, integrated HDR support, and a new PDF reader called Papers.

Improved installer and boot experience. This is a big deal for those wishing to dual-boot Windows 11 and Linux: The Ubuntu 25.04 installer now offers BitLocker support, so you no longer have to decrypt encrypted disks before installing.

ARM64 support. The Ubuntu 25.04 ISO is available in a new ARM64 version, so early adopters can install the system on Arm-based laptops and virtual machines (VMs). Ubuntu partnered with Qualcomm on this release and is the first step towards future “Snapdragon enablement.”

Lunar Lake support. Ubuntu 25.04 also supports Intel Core Ultra 200V (“Lunar Lake”) series processors with GPU and CPU ray tracing capabilities.

You can download Ubuntu 25.04 from the Ubuntu website. There are versions for Desktop, the Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) in Windows 11, and Server, plus a Core version for edge system and various flavors like Edubuntu, Kubuntu, Lubuntu, Ubuntu Budgie, Ubuntu Cinnamon, Ubuntu MATE, Ubuntu Studio, Xubuntu, and more.