AerynOS January 2026 Snapshot Updates GNOME, KDE Plasma, and COSMIC

After officially announcing their position on the use of LLMs a few days ago, AerynOS, an atomic-update-based (not to be confused with immutability) still-in-development Linux distro currently in alpha, has shared its latest project update for January 2026.

As with previous releases, the ISO is provided as a live GNOME image and primarily serves as a delivery mechanism for the project’s Lichen installer.

Even though GNOME remains the default live environment, users can choose between GNOME, KDE Plasma, COSMIC, a terminal-only setup, or assemble a custom environment using Wayland compositors such as MangoWC, Niri, or Sway.