Ubuntu 22.10 Switching To PipeWire For Linux Audio Handling

An early change made this week to Ubuntu 22.10 in its early development state is replacing the PulseAudio sound server with PipeWire.

PipeWire has been in use on Ubuntu for dealing with video streams but for Ubuntu 22.10 this autumn it will finally be using PipeWire for audio too. Other distributions like Fedora Workstation have already been using PipeWire for a while and it has matured quite nicely and proven to be reliable especially with the WirePlumber session manager. It's been quite smooth sailing recently for PipeWire when it comes to Linux desktop/laptop audio needs and finally Canonical is comfortable with making the switch for this next development cycle.

Ubuntu is finally transitioning to PipeWire for Linux audio!

As of this week in Ubuntu 22.10 "Kinetic Kudu" development PulseAudio was removed from the Ubuntu desktop along with other components like GStreamer PulseAudio integration. Meanwhile PipeWire-Pulse was added for PipeWire's PulseAudio support.

Heather Ellsworth of Canonical also confirmed on Friday that PipeWire for Ubuntu 22.10 is their intent.