Ubuntu Touch

Its user interface is written in Qt, and is designed primarily for touchscreen mobile devices such as smartphones and tablet computers, but the original goal of convergence was intended to bring Ubuntu Touch to laptops, desktops, IOT devices and TVs for a complete unified user experience.

The project was started by Canonical Ltd. but Mark Shuttleworth announced that Canonical would terminate support due to lack of market interest on 5 April 2017. It was then adopted by UBports as a community project. The UBports project was seeded by Marius Gripsgard in 2015 and the source code was transferred to the UBports Foundation where it now resides. UBports' mission is to support the collaborative development of Ubuntu Touch and to promote its widespread use.

The Ubuntu Touch project was started in 2011. Mark Shuttleworth announced on 31 October 2011 that by Ubuntu 14.04, the goal was that Ubuntu would support smartphones, tablets, smart TVs and other smart screens (such as car head units and smartwatches), but to date has only been supported by vendors on a few smartphones, one tablet and a number of third-party devices which hobbyists have ported the operating system to. The initial goal set by Shuttleworth for Ubuntu was to reach full convergence (same platform and libraries on all devices). The Ubuntu platform for phones was unveiled on 2 January 2013. The Ubuntu Touch Developer Preview was released on 21 February 2013. On 22 July 2013 Ubuntu announced a crowdfunding campaign for the Ubuntu Edge smartphone that would run Ubuntu Touch, but it did not reach its funding target.

Ubuntu Touch on a Fairphone 2, showing the lockscreen

Canonical released Ubuntu Touch 1.0, the first developer/partner version on 17 October 2013, along with Ubuntu 13.10 that "primarily supports the Galaxy Nexus and Nexus 4 phones, though there are images available for other phones and tablets", and released a "relatively 'stable' build for wider testing and feedback" on 17 April 2014, along with Ubuntu 14.04. A preview version of the software is available for installation on certain additional Android handsets including the Samsung Galaxy S4 Google Edition as a Developer Preview as of 21 February 2013. Developers have access to all of the source code under a license allowing modification and redistribution of the software.

Ubuntu Touch was released to manufacturers on 16 September 2014. BQ Aquaris E4.5 Ubuntu Edition, the world's first Ubuntu-based smartphone went on sale in Europe on 9 February 2015.

In April 2016, the world's first Ubuntu-based tablet, the BQ Aquaris M10 Ubuntu Edition, was released.

In August 2016, OTA-3 was announced to support Android 6.0 BSP.

In August 2018, UBPorts released its OTA-4, upgrading the Ubuntu Touch's base from the Canonical's starting Ubuntu 15.04 "Vivid Vervet" to the nearest, current long-term support version Ubuntu 16.04 LTS "Xenial Xerus"