All Fedora 44 KDE Variants To Use Plasma Login Manager Rather Than SDDM

Written by Michael Larabel in Fedora on 6 January 2026 at 02:28 PM EST. 58 Comments

The Fedora Engineering and Steering Committee (FESCo) has approved a Fedora 44 change for switching all KDE variants away from using the SDDM display manager to instead use the newer Plasma Login Manager.

Over the past year KDE developers have been developing the Plasma Login Manager as a modern alternative to SDDM and looking at GNOME's GDM as the "gold standard" for log-in/display managers.

👁 Plasma Login Manager

The Fedora 44 change proposal outlines the benefits for the KDE versions of Fedora Linux as:

"A new integrated login manager will be released alongside the upcoming KDE Plasma 6.6 release. As part of shipping this, the Fedora KDE variants will be switched to use it instead of SDDM. This will change the Fedora KDE Plasma Desktop Edition, Fedora KDE Plasma Mobile Spin, and Fedora Kinoite.
...
This allows Fedora to continue providing the highest quality, leading edge integrated KDE Plasma experience for its flagship edition and supports the development of its emerging variants by leveraging the recommended stack for a smooth experience from startup to shutdown."

This week FESCo approved this change for moving from SDDM to Plasma Login Manager for further enhancing the KDE Plasma experience on Fedora.