On a conventional, DNF-managed Fedora installation, find the desktop environment’s package group in your enabled repositories, inspect it, and install it with DNF. Then sign out and choose the new session at the graphical login screen if your display manager offers a session chooser. Fedora image-based editions use a different host package-management model, so do not assume the same DNF steps apply to them.
First, identify how your Fedora system is managed
These instructions apply to a conventional Fedora installation managed with DNF. Fedora also has image-based editions managed with rpm-ostree; their host package-management workflow differs. Fedora’s package-management documentation describes that distinction, but it is a legacy Fedora 28 document, not a current universal guide to changing desktops on image-based editions. If your system is image-based, stop here and follow documentation for your specific edition and release rather than running the DNF group commands below. Fedora’s package-management overview
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How to install another desktop environment on conventional Fedora
1. Find the available desktop groups
Open a terminal and list the groups available from your configured repositories:
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sudo dnf group list --available
Use the names returned on your own system. Group availability and naming can depend on the repositories enabled for your Fedora release, so do not rely on a desktop-group name copied from an older tutorial.
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2. Inspect the group before installing
Check the exact group name and its package selection. Put the name returned by your list command in quotation marks:
sudo dnf group info "<group name>"
DNF group information can show the included packages and whether the group or packages are installed or available. This is a useful check before adding a large set of software. DNF’s group commands and their behavior are documented in the DNF Command Reference.
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3. Install the group and review the transaction
Install the group using its exact local name:
sudo dnf group install "<group name>"
Review DNF’s proposed package changes before confirming. By default, group installation selects mandatory and default packages when possible; conditional packages are included when their requirements are met. Optional packages are not included unless you add --with-optional to the command. The transaction can be substantial, and its actual package list and disk impact depend on your system and repositories, so use DNF’s own preview rather than assuming a fixed size.
How to switch to the newly installed desktop
Installing the packages and starting a desktop session are separate steps. After installation, sign out to the graphical login screen. If the display manager offers a session chooser, select the desktop you installed before signing back in. The chooser’s location and wording vary by display manager, so there is no single Fedora-wide click path to rely on.
GNOME and KDE Plasma also have distinct software-management applications, as noted in Fedora’s application-installation documentation. That difference does not change the DNF group installation and sign-in steps described here. Fedora: Finding and installing Linux applications
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Keep both desktops or remove the original?
You can leave the original desktop installed while trying another session. This is the cautious option: keep the existing session until you have confirmed that the new one starts and works as you need.
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Removing a group is not necessarily a complete or harmless reversal. DNF removes packages from a group only when they are not also in another installed group and were not explicitly installed by the user. Review the proposed removal transaction carefully, and do not assume that removing a desktop group will cleanly undo every package change or leave all other software untouched. DNF documents this group-removal behavior in its command reference.
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