X.Org Server 26.1 RC1 lands with first major update in five years — here's what changed

Hot on the heels of the XWayland 26.1 RC1 release, the X.Org development team has tagged X.Org Server 26.1 Release Candidate 1. This marks the first major feature update to the xorg-server codebase in half a decade, succeeding the long-running xorg-server 21.1 series.

Despite the five-year gap, X.Org Server 26.1 is not nearly as feature-rich as the concurrent XWayland 26.1 development branch. However, it still brings a handful of meaningful changes that improve security, modernize the build process, and add new capabilities.

The most notable change is the removal of the legacy Autoconf/Automake build system. From now on, Meson is the only supported build system for xorg-server. This aligns the project with modern build practices and simplifies maintenance.

On the protocol side, the server now supports the DPMSInfoNotify event from the DPMS 1.2 specification, which allows display power management signaling to be more finely controlled. Support for XFixes 6.1 has been added, along with a new AllowForceTerminate option in xorg.conf.

Security improvements include disabling byte-swapped clients by default — a change that closes a class of potential exploits. Font server connections are also disabled by default, further reducing the attack surface. The Xvfb (virtual framebuffer) implementation now supports multiple CRTCs, enabling more flexible virtual display configurations. Additionally, the Xorg server now includes a DRM platform integration.

The final stable release of X.Org Server 26.1 is expected after the testing of RC1 concludes.