Desktop Layouts
Five arrangements — Classic, Traditional, Fluent, Focus, and Media and Games. One click rearranges the dock, the panel and the window buttons. Export the arrangement you like and import it on another machine.
Version 1.0.0 “Meridian” · built on Ubuntu 24.04 LTS
A desktop that
gets out of the way.
A familiar left dock, one window for themes and layouts, a guided first start, and documentation that works with no network at all. Free, open source, and no telemetry.
Checking for releases…
Download
One image boots on almost any 64-bit computer. Try it without installing anything — every session starts exactly as you left it.
How to check the download
Every release ships a SHA256SUMS file. After downloading:
sha256sum -c SHA256SUMSOn Windows, PowerShell:
Get-FileHash .\NovaOS-1.0.0-Meridian-amd64.iso -Algorithm SHA256The expected hash is printed next to each download button.
What’s in it
Appearance
A light theme and a dark theme, nine accent colours, five wallpapers and the desktop effect toggles, all in one window. Changes apply instantly.
Guided first start
A one-minute tour that checks your hardware, explains how the dock works and helps you pick a starting layout. It never runs twice.
Offline help
The full guide and every keyboard shortcut ship inside the system. No network, no search box, no answers written by a forum.
App Center
A short list of software that is known to work well, installed through the normal password prompt. Everything else is one click away in the full catalogue.
Backup
A straightforward front end for Déjà Dup: choose where, choose what, press one button. Backups are encrypted with your login password.
System requirements
| Processor | 64-bit, 2 GHz or faster |
|---|---|
| Memory | 4 GB, 8 GB or more recommended |
| Storage | 25 GB for the image, 40 GB installed |
| Graphics | Any 2007 or newer GPU; hardware acceleration on |
| Firmware | UEFI or legacy BIOS |
| Network | Optional — the live system works fully offline |
Questions people actually ask
Will it overwrite my current operating system?
Not unless you ask it to. Booting the ISO gives you a live desktop that changes nothing on your disk — reboot and your computer is exactly as it was. Installing is a separate, deliberate step with a confirmation screen.
Is it really Ubuntu underneath?
Yes. Nova OS is Ubuntu 24.04 LTS with GNOME, plus a desktop layer: its own themes, layouts, applications and defaults. That means the entire Ubuntu archive and security updates are available, which is the whole point of building on it.
How do I put it on a USB stick?
Download the ISO, then write it to a stick of 4 GB or larger.
On Linux: dd if=NovaOS-1.0.0-Meridian-amd64.iso of=/dev/sdX bs=4M
status=progress conv=fsync. On Windows, Rufus, balenaEtcher and
the built-in Media Creation Tool all work. This erases the stick.
What happens to my files if I install it?
The installer shows you what is on the disk before it touches anything, and offers to resize partitions alongside your existing system. You choose; it does not decide for you.
Does it phone home?
No. The site you are reading is served by Cloudflare Pages and the application is served by Cloudflare Workers with no analytics included. The operating system itself ships no telemetry. There is a network tab in the system settings you can watch if you like.
How do I report a problem?
The source is on GitHub. Open an issue with your hardware details from About Nova OS — the About window has a “Copy system report” button that grabs exactly what a bug report needs.