Intel Graphics On Ubuntu: GNOME vs. KDE vs. Xfce vs. Unity vs. LXDE

The ParaView data analysis and visualization tool saw close to the same performance across tested desktops but KDE Plasma 5 was slightly lower in some of the tests. In some of the ParaView tests, GNOME Shell on Wayland was finally a front-runner.

Regardless of windowed or full-screen, KDE Plasma 5.11 came in slower than the other desktops tested out-of-the-box.

A few of the tests show that GNOME Shell on Wayland has more room for improvement still in optimizing for performance as did KDE Plasma in some of the tests, at least when tested on Ubuntu in the current 18.04 Bionic Beaver development form. More tests on other GPUs will be coming as the Ubuntu 18.04 LTS release approaches in April.