Debian Plans GTK2 Removal in Forky Ahead of Debian 14 Release

The Debian GNOME team has announced plans to remove the GTK2 graphical toolkit from its Forky distribution branch before the release of Debian 14 in 2027. This decision aligns with broader industry trends, as Arch Linux removed GTK2 from official repositories several months prior, and Red Hat Enterprise Linux shipped RHEL 10 without GTK2 support.

GTK3, which replaced GTK2, has maintained a stable release series for over seven years since version 3.24 debuted in 2018. Most Debian packages depending on GTK2 have already been migrated, with the current affected package count reduced to less than 25% of the 2020 baseline documented in the Debian bug tracker. Exceptions include packages that gained GTK2 dependencies after 2020, select input methods, theme packages, and the openjdk-8 runtime.

The primary remaining obstacle is the graphical Debian Installer, which still relies on GTK2. As noted in the team's 2020 technical justification, GTK2 lacks critical modern features including HiDPI display support and native Wayland compatibility, and has been unmaintained for years.

This transition reflects the open-source ecosystem's gradual shift away from legacy toolkits as maintainers consolidate development around actively supported frameworks. The Debian team will coordinate with package maintainers to resolve final dependencies before the Debian 14 freeze window.