GIMP, one of the most popular Linux image editor, has reached the 2.9.5 development release, which will finally lead to the next stable GIMP release 2.10.
While Ubuntu 16.04 offers GIMP 2.8.16 in its main archive, you may either upgrade to the latest stable release, or try the 2.9 development release by following this simple tutorial.
GIMP 2.9/2.10 Features preview:
- 16/32 bit per channel support
- Lossless color space conversions
- New tool: Unified transformation
- Heavily improved scaling quality: No- and LoHalo-Samplers
- Sampling example 2 to see the high quality of the new samplers.
- More on-canvas previews
- Multi-core CPU / GPU support
- OpenCL-accelerated filters
- GEGL based filters and plugins
- ICC v4 color profile conversion support
- Color temperature correction
- Drop the Lanczos 3 sampler and Maximum RGB filter
How to Install GIMP 2.9.5 via PPA:
1. Add the dev PPA:
Open terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and run command:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:otto-kesselgulasch/gimp-edge
Type in password when it asks and hit Enter.
2. Install or upgrade GIMP:
For those who have a previous release installed, you can now upgrade GIMP via Software Updater utility:
Or just run the commands below on terminal to install GIMP 2.9.5:
sudo apt update && sudo apt install gimp gimp-gmic
3. Revert to GIMP stable release
Since GIMP 2.9 is unstable development release, there might be bugs and stability issues. You can easily revert to the stable GIMP 2.8.16, the stock version in Ubuntu 16.04 by running the commands below in terminal:
sudo apt install ppa-purge && sudo ppa-purge ppa:otto-kesselgulasch/gimp-edge