Configure the Touchpad and Multitouch Gestures

Modern Linux touchpad support is built on libinput, which handles everything from basic pointer acceleration to multitouch gesture recognition. Whether you're on Wayland or X11, GNOME or KDE, the foundation is the same — but how you tune it differs significantly. This guide walks through libinput configuration, three-finger and four-finger gestures, and desktop-environment-specific settings, with notes on where Wayland changes the picture.

How libinput Fits In

libinput is the input handling library used by both the Wayland compositor and the X.Org server (via xf86-input-libinput). It reads raw events from the kernel and applies tap-to-click, palm detection, scroll filtering, and gesture recognition before passing events up the stack. Virtually all modern distributions use it by default — the older synaptics driver is deprecated and absent from most current installs.

To see which driver is in use under X11:

xinput list
xinput list-props "your-touchpad-name"

Under Wayland there is no xinput. Instead, inspect libinput directly:

sudo libinput list-devices

The output lists every input device with its capabilities. Find your touchpad entry and confirm Gestures: yes appears in its feature list.

Install and Use libinput-debug-events

Before tuning anything, verify the kernel and libinput actually see your gestures.

# Debian/Ubuntu
sudo apt install libinput-tools

# Fedora / RHEL family
sudo dnf install libinput

# Arch
sudo pacman -S libinput

Run the debug tool, then move fingers on the touchpad:

sudo libinput debug-events --show-keycodes

Three-finger swipes will emit GESTURE_SWIPE_BEGIN, GESTURE_SWIPE_UPDATE, and GESTURE_SWIPE_END events. If you see them, the hardware and driver layer are working correctly. Press Ctrl+C to stop.

Tuning libinput via udev Rules (All Desktops, Both X11 and Wayland)

The persistent, desktop-agnostic way to set libinput properties is a udev hwdb override. This works on X11 and Wayland because the settings are applied before any compositor or X server reads the device.

Find Your Device's Match String

sudo libinput list-devices | grep -A5 -i touchpad

Note the Kernel: path, e.g. /dev/input/event4, then run:

udevadm info --attribute-walk /dev/input/event4 | grep -E 'idVendor|idProduct|name'

Create the Override File

sudo nano /etc/udev/hwdb.d/99-touchpad.hwdb

A typical entry (substitute your vendor/product IDs):

evdev:input:b0011v0002p0007*
 LIBINPUT_ATTR_TAP_ENABLED=1
 LIBINPUT_ATTR_NATURAL_SCROLL_ENABLED=1
 LIBINPUT_ATTR_POINTER_ACCEL=0.2

After saving, rebuild the hwdb and trigger the change without rebooting:

sudo systemd-hwdb update
sudo udevadm trigger /dev/input/event4

Common attribute keys: LIBINPUT_ATTR_TAP_ENABLED, LIBINPUT_ATTR_NATURAL_SCROLL_ENABLED, LIBINPUT_ATTR_POINTER_ACCEL (range −1.0 to 1.0), LIBINPUT_ATTR_DISABLE_WHILE_TYPING.

X11-Only: Tuning with an xorg.conf.d Snippet

If you are on X11 and prefer the traditional approach, drop a file in /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/. This does not work under Wayland.

sudo nano /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/40-libinput.conf

Section "InputClass"
    Identifier "touchpad"
    MatchIsTouchpad "on"
    Driver "libinput"
    Option "Tapping" "on"
    Option "NaturalScrolling" "true"
    Option "AccelSpeed" "0.2"
    Option "DisableWhileTyping" "on"
    Option "ClickMethod" "clickfinger"
EndSection

Restart the X session to apply. The ClickMethod option controls whether two-finger tap registers as a right-click (clickfinger) or a middle-click on three fingers (buttonareas).

Three-Finger and Four-Finger Gestures

libinput detects swipe and pinch gestures natively, but it does not bind them to actions on its own. You need a gesture daemon. The two most common choices are libinput-gestures (mature, config-file driven) and Fusuma (Ruby-based, more flexible).

libinput-gestures

# Debian/Ubuntu — install from GitHub or a PPA
sudo apt install libinput-gestures

# Arch (AUR)
git clone https://aur.archlinux.org/libinput-gestures.git
cd libinput-gestures && makepkg -si

# Add yourself to the input group (all distros)
sudo gpasswd -a $USER input

Log out and back in after adding yourself to the input group. Then copy the default config and edit it:

cp /etc/libinput-gestures.conf ~/.config/libinput-gestures.conf
nano ~/.config/libinput-gestures.conf

Example entries for a three-finger swipe on Wayland (using ydotool) and on X11 (using xdotool):

# Three-finger swipe left  → switch workspace (X11)
gesture swipe left 3 xdotool key super+Right

# Three-finger swipe right → switch workspace (X11)
gesture swipe right 3 xdotool key super+Left

# Three-finger swipe up    → show overview (X11/GNOME)
gesture swipe up 3 xdotool key super+s

# Pinch out → zoom in (X11)
gesture pinch out xdotool key plus

Under Wayland, replace xdotool with ydotool (install separately; requires the ydotoold daemon running). Alternatively, use wtype for text input events.

Enable and autostart:

libinput-gestures-setup autostart start

GNOME: Built-in and Extended Gesture Settings

GNOME 40+ on Wayland has native three-finger swipe gestures built into the compositor — three fingers left/right switches workspaces, three fingers up/down opens the Activities overview. These require no daemon.

Tune basic touchpad behavior in Settings → Mouse & Touchpad. For power users, use gsettings:

# Enable tap-to-click
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.peripherals.touchpad tap-to-click true

# Natural scrolling
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.peripherals.touchpad natural-scroll true

# Two-finger right-click
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.peripherals.touchpad click-method 'fingers'

# Disable while typing
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.peripherals.touchpad disable-while-typing true

# Acceleration profile: 'default', 'flat', or 'adaptive'
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.peripherals.touchpad accel-profile 'adaptive'

GNOME on X11 does not expose the native three-finger workspace gestures — use libinput-gestures in that case.

KDE Plasma: System Settings and Touchpad KCM

KDE Plasma has a dedicated System Settings → Input Devices → Touchpad panel (the kcm_touchpad module) that exposes most libinput options graphically, on both X11 and Wayland.

For gesture bindings under Plasma 5.24+ on Wayland, go to System Settings → Workspace Behavior → Touchpad Gestures. You can bind three-finger and four-finger swipes to actions like switching desktops, toggling Present Windows, or opening the application launcher.

On X11 with KDE, or if you need custom gesture commands, libinput-gestures works alongside KDE without conflict.

Apply settings via CLI using kwriteconfig5 if needed for scripting:

kwriteconfig5 --file kcminputrc --group Libinput --group 0003 --key TapToClick true
kbuildsycoca5 --noincremental

Verify Everything Is Working

# Check libinput sees your gestures live
sudo libinput debug-events | grep GESTURE

# Confirm libinput-gestures is running
libinput-gestures-setup status

# Confirm group membership took effect
id | grep input

If gestures fire but no action happens, verify xdotool or ydotool is installed and the relevant daemon (ydotoold) is running for Wayland setups.

Troubleshooting

• Gestures not detected at all: Run sudo libinput debug-events. If no GESTURE_SWIPE lines appear, the kernel driver may not support multitouch — check dmesg | grep -i input and confirm the touchpad is not falling back to a PS/2 mouse-only mode.
• Permission denied without sudo: You have not been added to the input group, or you have not logged out and back in since doing so. Verify with id.
• libinput-gestures starts but gestures do nothing (Wayland): xdotool does not work under a pure Wayland session. Install ydotool, start ydotoold as a user service, and update your config to use ydotool key ....
• Palm rejection is too aggressive or not aggressive enough: This is controlled by libinput's internal heuristics and is not currently exposed as a simple config knob. Filing a bug with your touchpad's hwdb match string and libinput record output is the right path.
• Conflict between GNOME native gestures and libinput-gestures: GNOME's Mutter consumes three-finger events on Wayland before they reach libinput-gestures. Use four-finger gestures in your libinput-gestures config for custom actions, and leave three-finger gestures to GNOME.