SUMMARY As of KDE Plasma 5.26, there is a limitation where I can't maintain more than 20 virtual desktops at any given time point. If I try to create an additional twenty first, it's as though nothing happened. The virtual desktop grid still shows me twenty virtual desktops. Changing the number of rows even doesn't have an effect. It's literally as though after adding a twenty first, nothing happens or gets accepted. To me, this means that internally there is a limit that you can't have more than 20 virtual desktops at the same time. This is very limiting. Comparing this to Cinnamon, I didn't encounter any limit on how many virtual desktops there may be (though of course, the virtual desktops would look rather small in a desktop grid, but that's to be expected with a high number of virtual desktops). I'd prefer that Plasma wouldn't be limited to a particular number of virtual desktops, and that I may have as many of them as I need. Additionally, it may make sense to maintain a global variable for the number of virtual desktops, and each activity may either use that value, or override it. That is, each activity either has as many virtual desktops as the global variable, or it may have a particular number of them, independent of how many other activities have. OBSERVED RESULT Despite the system settings app indicating that there are more than 20 virtual desktops, in practice, when using the virtual desktop grid, there is never more than 20 virtual desktops. EXPECTED RESULT The possibility of having as many virtual desktops as the user needs, instead of being limited to a particular number. SOFTWARE/OS VERSIONS Linux/KDE Plasma: openSUSE Tumbleweed KDE Plasma Version: 5.26.4 KDE Frameworks Version: 5.101.0 Qt Version: 5.15.7 ADDITIONAL INFORMATION This was what prompted bug https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=464449 in the first place. I had to create additional, related activities to achieve a higher number of virtual desktops. It seems that activities is the only way to maintain more than 20 virtual desktops. But as I said, each activity maintains as many virtual desktops as all others. I'd prefer it if each activity would have its own number of virtual desktops unique to it.
That's weird, I can create desktops number 21 and 22. I think this is a bug, rather than an intentional change.
I don't know for sure why the maximum number of virtual desktops is capped at 20, but my guess is that it's just unreasonable to have _that_ many virtual desktops, you need to have really really good memory to keep track of where each thing is on. No objections to removing the cap even though I can't find a valid practical example where you need more than 20 vds. As far as I know, the cap is not enforced by any spec.
I'm currently able to create more than 20 virtual desktops on Neon Testing. If you're still able to reproduce this in Plasma 6.4.0 or later, please set this back to REPORTED. Thanks.
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(In reply to TraceyC from comment #3) > I'm currently able to create more than 20 virtual desktops on Neon Testing. > If you're still able to reproduce this in Plasma 6.4.0 or later, please set > this back to REPORTED. Thanks. Sorry for the late reply. I'm on openSUSE Tumbleweed, running KDE Plasma 6.4.1 and KDE Frameworks 6.15. I regret to inform that this bug is still a problem. In the system settings app, I can raise the number of desktops to as many as I please. In practice, neither the Overview nor the Desktop Grid features can actually see any desktops beyond 20. And the feature to add more desktops from the Overview works as some sort of an identity function, literally doing nothing. In fact, there's a quirk where in the settings app if I set the number of workspaces higher than 20 (no visible effect for that setting), and try to add a new desktops from the Overview, it resets the number of workspaces to twenty again in the settings app. Similarly, with the number of workspaces higher than 20, changing the number of desktop rows has no effect. I was running KDE Neon (stable) for some time since this ticket, and I believe I had that same issue there too. That issue has been there for as long as I can remember while using Plasma. I even had it on Fedora with versions 5.18 and up. So I dare say that issue is reproducible on different versions and environments. Regarding the workflow for that many desktops, I like to have between one to three windows per desktop, with that desktop serving a very specific semantic purpose. Many times I end up having more than ten desktops, and it's not uncommon to have gotten close to 20, if I stick to one activity. 25 would be a reasonable maximum for me, if I can convince Plasma to have that many. Sorry for the wall of text.
I would like to add that this is a minor bug, this unofficial cap. If I pretend it doesn't exist, I must say, I'm really enjoying Plasma 6. It's great, and it serves me excellently. I tried recent versions of GNOME and Cinnamon. No thanks. I'm sticking with my dear Plasma. Activities is a killer feature, to be honest. I'd highly recommend KDE Plasma to anyone.
I would like to add a small insight: I created a new user on my machine, which also uses Plasma 6.4.1. As such, it must be free of configuration debt, unlike my current user, for instance. I opened the Overview and kept adding more desktops. It worked like a breeze (no pun intended) ... until it hit the number 20, in which case it turned into a dummy button. Clearly this bug is reproducible (at least on openSUSE Tumbleweed) even on fresh new accounts free of any existing desktop configurations. Just a small insight that I thought may be valuable.
Thank you for the additional information, that helps clarify the problem you're facing. I'm re-titling this to make it clear that it's the Overview and Desktop Grid that don't work with more than 20 Virtual Desktops. I'll let the developers take a closer look from here.
(In reply to TraceyC from comment #8) > Thank you for the additional information, that helps clarify the problem > you're facing. I'm re-titling this to make it clear that it's the Overview > and Desktop Grid that don't work with more than 20 Virtual Desktops. > > I'll let the developers take a closer look from here. Hmm. Now that you frame it like that, I thought I'd try and see whether the keyboard shortcuts for navigating through desktops do obey the more than 20 rule, even if Grid and Overview don't work. Turns out they don't. But in the process I just noticed something quite weird: If I go to the settings app, add two more desktops over my twenty ones, apply the settings, then immediately just switch to the KWin Scripts tab (the one above it, or perhaps any other settings tab, actually), and return back, I see there are only twenty. It's as if the settings app itself doesn't understand the concept of more than twenty. From that insight, I think the problem is somewhere in the settings app, because if it itself doesn't register more than twenty, then of course all else in the system won't see more than twenty either. The settings app is what dictates how the rest of the system sees the settings, doesn't it now? At least, that's how I see it, as a hobby programmer myself. Just to try and carry out some further testing, can you tell me where the settings for workspaces are stored? I know for a fact that all settings are stored as an army of plain text config files under `~/.config` (and some KDE apps (like the titlebar stuff) have their settings stored under `~/.local/share`, too). Perhaps if I sidestepped the settings app and manually modified the configuration of workspaces there by myself, I can very this hypothesis I present? In all cases, it's an honor to help KDE. I really want to try out this hypothesis myself.
Okay, so I found the config file that had the number of virtual desktop setting: `~/.config/kwinrc`. So I tried to modify it to make it 25 virtual desktops, and 5 rows. And then, like any greedy idiot, I ran `kwin_wayland --replace` without saving unsaved work (a decision I sincerely regret). Kwin crashed, and I was brought to the login screen. However, what shocked me was that after that unfortunate event, I literally couldn't log back in! I kept getting a black screen, waited for a few seconds, and was then returned back to the login screen again. And again. And again! It was only when I logged back in through a TTY and modified that config file back to 20 that I could log in again, as though I just recovered from a restart. The only difference is that they're now five rows, instead of four (so clearly that was the correct file). I dare say the issue has little to do with a system settings app and more with something far more serious, if the window manager literally can't boot me into a working session. But at this point, I can't make any argument as to what's wrong without knowing how Plasma itself works (which I sure as hell don't know). So, I think I've done all that I can for this particular issue. (Unless I received further instructions.) If the system settings apps knows that setting the desktops to more than twenty breaks the entire God damn session, then I must applaud the settings app for preventing me from shooting myself in the foot through the official way. It clearly knows what it's doing, so well done for it. (Please, no offense, nothing against KDE or its great developers; I like to use that expression as a strong intensifier.) In all cases, have a great day. Cheers.
Thanks for all that extra detail, and for explaining your use case. I'll update the title again.
Hello all! This MR is very relevant: https://invent.kde.org/plasma/kwin/-/merge_requests/6922 It raises the Desktop Grid/Virtual Desktop count to 25, along with allowing choice of auto-arrange in the grid view. From what I can tell it fulfills this request :)
A possibly relevant merge request was started @ https://invent.kde.org/plasma/kwin/-/merge_requests/7901
A possibly relevant merge request was started @ https://invent.kde.org/plasma/kwin-x11/-/merge_requests/51
I should say I get used to 24 virtual desktops accessed with hotkeys Alt-Fx and Alt-Shift-Fx. I'm on Gentoo, so I've fixed this issue for myself using trivial patch: ```console $ cat /etc/portage/patches/kde-plasma/kwin/24-virtual-desktops.patch diff -uNr kwin-6.3.5.orig/src/virtualdesktops.h kwin-6.3.5/src/virtualdesktops.h --- kwin-6.3.5.orig/src/virtualdesktops.h 2025-05-06 20:57:40.000000000 +0300 +++ kwin-6.3.5/src/virtualdesktops.h 2025-07-22 20:02:08.283978351 +0300 @@ -549,7 +549,7 @@ inline uint VirtualDesktopManager::maximum() { - return 20; + return 24; } inline uint VirtualDesktopManager::count() const ```
Git commit a3911a132fb926c5458b6e9b4a015b7e3e666cad by Méven Car, on behalf of Blazer Silving. Committed on 27/10/2025 at 18:52. Pushed by meven into branch 'master'. virtualdesktops: Raise virtual desktop limit to 25 M +1 -1 src/virtualdesktops.h https://invent.kde.org/plasma/kwin-x11/-/commit/a3911a132fb926c5458b6e9b4a015b7e3e666cad
Git commit c8db7e07d63c8980336bc599576aff7613b74978 by Méven Car, on behalf of Blazer Silving. Committed on 27/10/2025 at 18:56. Pushed by meven into branch 'master'. virtualdesktops: Raise virtual desktop limit to 25 M +1 -1 src/virtualdesktops.h https://invent.kde.org/plasma/kwin/-/commit/c8db7e07d63c8980336bc599576aff7613b74978