LinPad

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📸 Screenshots

Visual Studio Code editing a React and TypeScript project	Firefox browsing Wikipedia
LinPad Store with Linux apps and developer tools	Aqua desktop with files and terminal
Classic 98 desktop	Platinum desktop

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🚀 Why LinPad?

The iPad Air M3 is as fast as a MacBook Air. Put a Logitech keyboard with a trackpad on it and it looks like a laptop — but it can't do laptop things. No real terminal. No VS Code. No Linux tools. A powerful machine that ends up as a Netflix screen.

LinPad turns it into the computer the hardware already is.

	Stock iPadOS	LinPad
Desktop	Stage Manager	Real windowed desktop with tiling, snapping, workspaces
Terminal	Toy shells	Full Alpine Linux — apk, bash, Node, Python, git
Code editor	Web-based at best	Visual Studio Code (the real one)
Browser engine	WebKit only	Firefox + Safari's engine side by side
Linux GUI apps	❌	Thunar, Mousepad, VLC, GTK & Qt apps
AI coding	❌	Claude Code in the terminal and VS Code
Keyboard + trackpad	Partial	Right-click, shortcuts, pointer everywhere
Cost	—	Free & open source

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✨ Features

🖥️ Native Desktop

Feature	Description
Window manager	Move, resize from any edge, snap to halves and quarters, maximize, minimize to the taskbar
Auto-tiling	Master-stack, columns, grid and monocle layouts — on or off per workspace, float any window
Workspaces	Switch with keys or three-finger swipes, drag windows between them in the overview
Overview & switcher	Exposé-style overview, ⌥Tab switcher with live thumbnails, taskbar hover previews
Notification center	History, Do Not Disturb, swipe to dismiss
Quick settings	Volume, brightness, appearance, style, tiling, battery, network, fast mode
Lock screen & session	Lock, restart the desktop session, session restore on launch

🎨 Styles & Themes

Feature	Description
Five desktop styles	LinPad, Windows, macOS, Ubuntu, Kylin — each changes the layout, not just colours
Matching Linux themes	GTK & Qt themes, cursors and fonts follow the style (Fluent, WhiteSur, Yaru, UKUI, Adwaita)
Icon packs	Papirus, Fluent, WhiteSur, Yaru, UKUI and more — independent of the style
Light & dark	Per style, or follow iPadOS
Wallpapers	Photos, Files, ~/Pictures, or browse Wallhaven (SFW only) right from the desktop

🐧 Real Linux

Feature	Description
Alpine Linux 3.21	Unmodified aarch64 binaries, full apk package manager
Linux GUI apps as native windows	Built-in Wayland compositor — every Linux window is a real iPad window
Firefox	The real thing, tuned for LinPad
Visual Studio Code	Microsoft's official build, installed on first use, with extensions & the integrated terminal
Developer tools	Node 22, npm, git, Python, Vite with hot reload, TypeScript, Claude Code
Lean by design	Optional apps — mail, PDF viewer, office, image editor, VLC — are ticked by you, never preinstalled

⚡ Performance

Feature	Description
Native ARM64 JIT	≈4.8× faster than the threaded-code engine — tsc 5.4×, Node 12×, vite build 3.5×
Fast mode in one tap	Hands off to StikDebug (iPadOS 17.4+) or, for a copy installed with TrollStore (iPadOS 14.0–16.6.1, 16.7 RC, 17.0), to TrollStore at launch and comes back with JIT enabled
GPU acceleration	Linux Vulkan & OpenGL ES on the Apple GPU (Venus → virglrenderer → MoltenVK → Metal)
Firefox	Scrolling at 30–50 fps, URL bar in ~40 ms

⌨️ Input & Integration

Feature	Description
Keyboard, trackpad, touch	All first-class; touch-sized controls when no keyboard is attached
Right-click everywhere	Desktop, Files, title bars, taskbar, and inside Linux apps
Text input for every language	Accents, emoji, dictation, Japanese & Chinese composition — in Linux apps too
Clipboard & drag-and-drop	Between Linux apps, native apps and iPadOS
Sound	Linux audio plays through iOS
Files app	Thunar-style manager with Trash, Open With, Properties, desktop as a real folder

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🧠 How it works

LinPad does not run a virtual machine and needs no jailbreak — it is one iPad app.

flowchart TB
    subgraph app["LinPad app (one iOS process)"]
        desk["DesktopKit — SwiftUI desktop shell<br/>windows · tiling · workspaces · styles · apps"]
        bridge["Linux window bridge<br/>frames · input · clipboard · DnD · text input"]
        audio["Audio bridge → AVAudioEngine"]
        gpu["virglrenderer + MoltenVK → Metal"]
        emu["iSH-ARM64 emulator<br/>Linux syscall translation · ARM64 JIT"]
    end
    subgraph guest["Alpine Linux (aarch64)"]
        apps["Firefox · VS Code · Thunar · VLC · foot · node · git · claude"]
        ishwl["ishwl — Wayland compositor"]
        pulse["PulseAudio"]
        mesa["Mesa Venus / Zink"]
    end
    apps --> ishwl --> bridge --> desk
    apps --> pulse --> audio
    apps --> mesa --> gpu
    guest -. "runs on" .-> emu

Layer	What it does
Emulator	Fork of iSH / iSH-ARM64: translates Linux system calls to iOS; LinPad adds a native ARM64 JIT and dozens of kernel fixes (signals, sockets, memory, inotify, netlink, futexes, memfd, virtio-gpu)
ishwl	A small Wayland compositor inside Linux; each window's pixels are shared through memory-mapped files, input goes back through FIFOs
DesktopKit	The native SwiftUI desktop — one window manager for native apps and Linux windows
GPU	A virtio-gpu device in the emulator feeds virglrenderer's Venus renderer, running on MoltenVK and Metal

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⚡ Quick start

Requirement	Specification
iPad	Apple Silicon (M1 or newer) — developed on an iPad Air M3, iPadOS 27.2
Mac	Xcode, Homebrew llvm lld meson ninja libarchive, libimobiledevice
Account	An Apple developer account (LinPad is sideloaded, not on the App Store)
Optional	StikDebug + LocalDevVPN for fast mode, or TrollStore 2.0.12+ with its URL scheme turned on

export PATH=/opt/homebrew/opt/lld/bin:/opt/homebrew/opt/llvm/bin:$PATH

gpu/build-third-party.sh          # virglrenderer + MoltenVK (once)
release/build-rootfs.sh           # the Alpine system image (~50 min)

xcodebuild -skipMacroValidation -project iSH.xcodeproj -scheme iSH-ARM64 -configuration Release -destination generic/platform=iOS \
  -allowProvisioningUpdates SYMROOT=$PWD/build-ios-release IPHONEOS_DEPLOYMENT_TARGET=16.0 \
  DEVELOPMENT_TEAM=<your team> ISH_JIT_BUILD=enabled build

release/embed-rootfs.sh --device "build-ios-release/Release-iphoneos/iSH ARM64.app" \
  release/out/ish-linux-rootfs-arm64.tar.gz
ideviceinstaller install "build-ios-release/Release-iphoneos/iSH ARM64.app"

Full guide: release/INSTALL-DEVICE.md

Visual Studio Code is Microsoft's proprietary build. It is downloaded on your iPad when you choose to install it and is never redistributed by this project.

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📲 Install & updates

LinPad is sideloaded with your own Apple ID. Each release has an IPA, and SideStore and AltStore can follow the LinPad source:

https://raw.githubusercontent.com/fspecii/LinPad/main/release/source.json

Sideloader	Install	Updates
SideStore / AltStore	Add the source above, then install LinPad	Offered by the sideloader, or Settings › Updates › Update via SideStore
iloader, Sideloadly, Xcode	Download LinPad-<version>.ipa from the release	Install the new IPA with the same Apple ID; your Linux system and files are kept

Inside LinPad	What it does
App updates	Checks GitHub at launch and every 6 hours (never on Low Data Mode), shows the release notes and opens your sideloader
Linux system updates	Downloads the new system in the background, verifies its SHA-256 and installs it at the next launch — /root, /home and your packages are kept
Linux packages	apk upgrade with one tap, weekly check

Cutting a release: release/RELEASING.md

Releases contain only redistributable software. Visual Studio Code and Claude Code are installed on your iPad from Settings › Apps when you choose them.

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⌨️ Keyboard & trackpad

Shortcut	Action
⌃⌥A	Applications
⌃⌥T	New terminal
⌃⌥W	Close window
⌃⌥M	Minimize
⌃⌥← ⌃⌥→ ⌃⌥↑	Snap left / right / maximize
⌃⌥U I J K	Snap to quarters
⌃⌥⇧T	Toggle auto-tiling
⌃⌥O	Overview
⌥Tab	Window switcher
⌃⌥1…9	Switch workspace
⌘ …	Goes to the app (⌘S saves, ⌘W closes a tab, ⌘C/⌘V copy & paste)
Two-finger click	Right-click
Three-finger swipe	Overview / switch workspace

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🗺️ Roadmap

• Native desktop with tiling, snapping, workspaces, five styles
• Real Firefox, VS Code, Thunar, VLC as native windows
• Native ARM64 JIT with one-tap fast mode
• GPU acceleration via Venus → Metal
• Wallhaven wallpapers, icon packs, notification center
• Optional app catalog: mail client, PDF viewer, office, image editor (tick to install)
• iPad Files & Photos access from Linux
• Quick Look with Space, like macOS
• Faster Firefox page loads, lower memory

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💻 Tech stack

Layer	Technologies
Desktop	Swift, SwiftUI, UIKit
Emulator	C, ARM64 assembly, iSH, meson
Linux	Alpine Linux 3.21, Mesa (Venus/Zink), PulseAudio, GTK, Qt
Graphics	Wayland, virglrenderer, MoltenVK, Metal

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👤 About the Author

LinPad is built and maintained by Vali Neagu (valineagu.com · @AmbsdOP on X · fspecii on GitHub).

I bought an iPad Air M3, attached a Logitech keyboard with a trackpad, and realised I owned a laptop-class machine that couldn't run a terminal, an editor or a real browser. LinPad is the fix.

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🙏 Credits

• iSH — the Linux shell for iOS that started it all
• iSH-ARM64 — the native ARM64 guest backend LinPad builds on
• Alpine Linux — the lightweight Linux underneath
• Mesa, virglrenderer, MoltenVK — the GPU path
• StikDebug — JIT on modern iPadOS
• Wallhaven — wallpapers
• The open-source themes and icon packs in themes/, each under its own license

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📄 License

LinPad is licensed under the GPLv3, like iSH — see LICENSE.md. The original iSH README is kept at docs/README-iSH.md.

Source code for releases. Each release attaches linpad-source-<version>.tar.gz (this repository at the release tag) and SOURCES.md / sources-manifest.json, which list every package in the bundled Linux system with the exact source it was built from: the Alpine aports commit of each package, the Debian and Ubuntu theme source packages, and the pinned theme and icon repositories. SOURCES.md also carries the written offer of source for the GPL and LGPL components.

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