Keepers of Noble Numbats to be offered a Resolute Racoon: Ubuntu 26.04.1 is coming

It looks like the Racoon has bedded in and settled down, as Canonical releases the first point release of this year’s Ubuntu LTS version, offering an upgrade to users on Ubuntu 24.04 LTS (Noble Numbat).

Ubuntu 26.04.1 is the first point release of April’s long-term support version, which will be supported until 2031.

Assuming that it follows the pattern of previous Ubuntu LTS releases, 26.04.1 will be followed by four further point releases – usually, the final release comes a little while after the following LTS release.

That means Ubuntu 26.04.5 should arrive some time after Ubuntu 28.04 - meaning in or around September 2028.

It’s accompanied by most of the remixes releasing matching point releases: Kubuntu, Ubuntu Budgie, Lubuntu, Ubuntu Kylin, Ubuntu Studio, Xubuntu, Edubuntu, and Ubuntu Cinnamon.

Notably, two flavors are missing from this list.

There are 10 official flavors but only eight point releases lists.

There was no official 26.04 release of Ubuntu MATE.

Maintainer Martin Wimpress has stepped down – he has a new project called Nøughty Linux he’s working on instead.

There’s not much to see on the website yet, but if you’re curious, his talk at the 2025 Ubuntu Summit will give you a taste.

Ubuntu Unity isn’t in that list, either.

That remix missed the 25.10 release cycle because lead developer Rudra Saraswat – whom we first talked to in 2022, when he was 12 – is at university.

The good news is that some developers did step up to help and there is an Ubuntu Unity 26.04 release.

It replaces a bunch of subcomponents of the previous version, though, and that means it’s officially not an LTS release.