Solus

COLLECTIVE

We build open source desktop experiences and the Solus operating system that is designed for home computing.

This is Solus's page Solus

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About

Solus is an open source project dedicated to building an independent and cohesive Linux desktop experience aimed at home and office use.

We deliver continuous updates on 4 distinct editions: Budgie, GNOME, Plasma, and XFCE.
We maintain our own kernel and toolchain, optimized for desktop users.
We curate a central package recipe repository where everyone can learn to contribute.
We build welcoming communities on the Solus Forum, in the Solus Matrix Rooms, and on Reddit.
We share project news with the world through our blog posts, and on Mastodon.

Your support pays for:

Recurring expenses, including:
- Website hosting (Digital Ocean)
- Package building infrastructure (Hetzner)
- Mass mailer service (Mailgun)
- Email and Document hosting (Google Workspaces)
- Shared account access (Bitwarden)
- Domain registration and upkeep
- Content Distribution Network (Cloudflare)
Direct compensation of developers, for example:
- Paying Solus Staff for the time they spend on completing particularly arduous, complex or tedious tasks, such as large stack upgrades, tooling upgrades, infrastructure work, wholesale reworks of documentation, etc.
- Paying Community Contributors a bounty to solve thorny issues
Reimbursement for hardware purchases by Solus Staff. Hardware purchases enables the following:
- Increased compatibility through direct testing of hardware components
- Increased productivity via sensible upgrades to more modern hardware that speeds up development workflows
Other expenses at the discretion of the Solus Staff

Solus project expenses are recommended by the Solus Staff Admin team, then voted on by the larger Solus Staff group. All expenses are publicly disclosed here on the Open Collective platform.

To support Budgie Desktop development, which is separate and under the Buddies of Budgie organization, visit their Open Collective.

Disclaimer: Your contribution is a donation. Perks are provided as a courtesy, on a best-effort basis, and are not guaranteed. No goods or services are expected in exchange for a donation. Any requests for refunds for those purposes will be rejected by Open Collective.

Our team

Tracey Clark

Admin

David Harder

Admin

Joey Riches

Admin

Reilly Brogan

Admin

EbonJaeger

Core Contributor

Hans Kelson

Admin

Estimated Annual Budget

$10,175

Today's Balance

$12,615.21

2 Full-time Developers

$100,000

per year

Contribute

Become a financial contributor.

Financial Contributions

Membership

Backers

Help support Solus development with a monthly donation!

Starts at

$1 USD / month

Latest activity by

+ 88

Membership

Release Testers

Want to help us test before the next release? Perks: Access to Release Candidate (RC) ISOs for all editions.

Starts at

$3 USD / month

Latest activity by

+ 145

Membership

Beta Testers

Want to help us test pre-release ISOs, and have access to the most up to date ISOs every month? Perks: Access to Snapshot ISOs for all editions mo... Read more

Starts at

$10 USD / month

Latest activity by

+ 82

Membership

Crew

Welcome aboard! Perks: Access to snapshot ISOs for all editions every sync (usually weekly), as well as Release Candidate ISOs for all editions.

Starts at

$25 USD / month

Latest activity by

+ 29

Custom contribution

Donation

Make a custom one-time or recurring contribution.

Latest activity by

+ 643

Top financial contributors

Individuals

Incognito

$1,400 USD since Jun 2021

Reilly Brogan

$1,250 USD since May 2021

Incognito

$1,250 USD since May 2021

Phillip Melvin

$1,175 USD since Oct 2021

hash

$1,075 USD since Jul 2021

Joe Alden

$1,015 USD since May 2021

Tracey Clark

$962 USD since May 2021

WetGeek

$900 USD since May 2021

Eric Hecker

$900 USD since Aug 2022

Wini-Buh

$850 USD since Dec 2021

Collin

$775 USD since May 2021

Incognito

$635 USD since May 2021

Tom Scharbach

$600 USD since Jul 2021

Max Bradbury

$575 USD since Jun 2021

Stuart Rose

$575 USD since Jun 2021

Organizations

Nalo Labs

$440 USD since Nov 2021

PRAZEWORKS

$142 USD since Aug 2021

Solus is all of us

Our contributors 651

Thank you for supporting Solus.

Tracey Clark

Admin

$962 USD

David Harder

Admin

$50 USD

Joey Riches

Admin

Reilly Brogan

Admin

EbonJaeger

Core Contributor

Hans Kelson

Admin

Incognito

Crew

$1,400 USD

Reilly Brogan

Crew

$1,250 USD

Incognito

Crew

$1,250 USD

Phillip Melvin

Crew

$1,175 USD

hash

Crew

$1,075 USD

Joe Alden

Crew

$1,015 USD

Budget

Transparent and open finances.

Monthly financial contribution to Solus (Backers)

Credit from Alex K to Solus • July 28, 2025

+$1.00USD

Completed

Contribution #462903

Monthly financial contribution to Solus (Beta Testers)

Credit from Seth Storm Rosenaa to Solus • July 28, 2025

+$10.00USD

Completed

Contribution #835667

Monthly financial contribution to Solus (Backers)

Credit from Guest to Solus • July 28, 2025

+$1.00USD

Completed

Contribution #529197

Today’s balance

$12,615.21 USD

Total raised

$42,553.60 USD

Total disbursed

$29,938.39 USD

Estimated annual budget

$10,174.86 USD

Connect

Let’s get the ball rolling!

News from Solus

Updates on our activities and progress.

Weekly snapshots for the new 4.7 release "Endurance" are available.

Solus is proud to provide the first weekly snapshots for our 4.7 release, "Endurance". As usual, these will be made available to our Crew tier. The next set will be made available to Crew and Beta Testers, as they will be snapshots of the f...

Published on February 2, 2025 by Tracey Clark

The ISOs are rolling again

We've had several weeks without ISOs being mailed out; the pause was needed to roll out the initial stages of the usr merge. With...

Published on September 27, 2024 by Tracey Clark

Solus MATE Transition Tool v0.3 will be made available to Beta Testers later this week

As you may be aware as of the Solus 4.4 the MATE Edition was deprecated, and, of Solus 4.5 we're no longer producing a MATE Edition. For existing Solus MATE users we wish to provide a way to safety transition to another desktop environment...

Published on January 21, 2024 by Joey Riches