How to upgrade to KDE Neon 20.04
The new version of KDE Neon is out! If you’re running the version based on Ubuntu 18.04 and are excited to upgrade, but don’t know how to do it, we can help! Follow along with this guide as we go over how you can upgrade your KDE Neon base from Ubuntu 18.04 to Ubuntu 20.04.
Note: the upgrade process in KDE Neon is covered heavily in this guide. If you do not want to do the upgrade and instead would prefer a fresh installation, we highly recommend checking out neon.kde.org.
Update your system
Before attempting to upgrade from KDE Neon 18.04 to the new 20.04 release, you must update your system. The reason your system needs to be updated is that Neon cannot detect the new release without upgrading.
There are two different ways to upgrade KDE Neon’s packages. In this guide, we will show you how to do both. To start the upgrading process, follow the instructions outlined below that corresponds with the type of upgrade you wish to do.
GUI updating
The easiest way to upgrade your KDE Neon system’s packages is with the KDE Discover software utility. Follow the step-by-step instructions below to update.
Step 1: Launch KDE Neon by searching for it in the app menu on the KDE desktop. Once Discover is open, look for the “Updates” icon in the bottom-left portion of the app window, and click on it with the mouse.
Step 2: In the “Updates” area, you will see pending updates for your KDE Neon system. Click on the “Check for Updates” button with the mouse to check for updates.
Step 3: Locate the “Update All” button, and select it. By selecting this button, you will tell KDE to install all of the operating system updates available.
When the update is complete, log out of your Plasma desktop session and log back in.
Terminal updating
Updating from the terminal is arguably simpler than from the GUI. To update all of the packages on your computer to the latest, launch a terminal window on the desktop. Once the terminal window is open, run the update and upgrade commands in succession.
sudo apt update
sudo apt upgrade -y sudo apt dist-upgrade -y
After running both of these commands, you may need to sit back for a few minutes to allow all of the packages to install. When the upgrade process is complete, you will be able to type into the terminal once again.
Log out of your KDE Plasma session and then log back in to complete the updating process.
Upgrading KDE Neon with GUI
If you want to upgrade your KDE Neon system from 18.04 to 20.04, the best way to go is with the GUI. The upgrading tool explains everything in plain English and takes care of everything automatically with no need to deal with the terminal.
To start the upgrading process, look for the “Upgrade available” notification that appears when you log in and click on the “Upgrade” button with the mouse. After clicking on the “Upgrade” button, a pop-up will appear with the release notes for KDE Neon 20.04. Be sure to read through them as they will tell you about all the new features you’re about to get!
Once you’ve read through all of the release notes, look for the “Upgrade” button on the bottom of the screen and click on it to move on to the next page in the upgrade process.
On the next page, you will see the upgrader. The upgrader will do several things to your system, including preparing the upgrade (changing software sources from 18.04 to 20.04), download the new packages, clean up and restart. All you have to do is sit back and follow the on-screen directions that appear. It’ll take about 20 minutes to complete!
When the upgrader completes, it will reboot your PC. When your PC turns back on, log in and enjoy KDE Neon 20.04!
Upgrading KDE Neon from terminal
If you’re not a fan of upgrading your OS through the GUI, you’ll be happy to know it’s very easy to do with the terminal. To start, launch a terminal window and use the sed commands below to change Neon’s repositories from Ubuntu Bionic to Ubuntu Focal (18.04 to 20.04).
sudo sed -i 's/bionic/focal/g' /etc/apt/sources.list
sudo sed -i 's/bionic/focal/g' /etc/apt/sources.list.d/neon.list
After changing the two repos from “Bionic” to “Focal,” run the update command to update Neon so that it starts using the newly updated repositories.
sudo apt update
Following the update command, run the upgrade command to install all of the new packages available to install from the Focal repository for Neon.
sudo apt upgrade -y
Following the upgrade command, you will need to run the dist-upgrade command with the –allow-downgrades command-line switch.
sudo apt dist-upgrade --allow-downgrades
Finally, run the autoremove command to remove all of the packages from Neon 18.04 that are still present on the system. These packages could cause problems for the new update, so it’s best to remove them.
sudo apt autoremove
With all of the old packages uninstalled, reboot your computer. Once logged back in, you will be using KDE Neon 20.04!
Same here – thank you sooooo much!
This article is absolutely wrong. KDE Neon doesn’t like apt command. Their website or terminal recommend to use this command:
pkcon
Hence, to full upgrade and install use this command:
sudo pkcon refresh && sudo pkcon update
To all read pkcon manual firstly.
I so surprised that like this article is added without any verification.
how do i know what ubunto version i am using with my kde neon
Thank you so much for this article! I’ve been trying to upgrade my system for long! All the time the icon to upgrade popped up I needed to install updates first, and than the icon disappeared again. Finally with your terminal instructions, I was able to upgrade my system!
Thank you very much!