If you’ve ever used Linux, there’s a good chance you’ve used Linux Mint, a user-friendly distribution that’s based on Ubuntu. Well, the developers behind the project also have another version of Linux Mint, but it’s based on Debian, which is the base of Ubuntu. This version is referred to as LMDE or Linux Mint Debian Edition.
Last month, we got the beta release of LMDE 7, which is based on the latest Debian 13. Now, however, it looks like the Linux Mint team is working on the final version of LMDE 7 as the ISOs are going through final checks. Once released, you’ll be able to install LMDE 7 and it’ll continue to get updates until 30 June 2030 - with Windows 10 support ending soon, it’ll be a solid option for keeping older computers alive.
The ISO being tested is labeled as lmde-7-cinnamon-amd64-2025.10.07-16.33, it has a status of “Being tested” with “Rejected” or “Approved for Stable release” being the possible outcomes in the following hours or days.
According to It’s FOSS, LMDE 7 will ship with Linux 6.12 which means it has support for more up to date hardware. It also incorporates the latest changes to the Cinnamon desktop and functions quite similar to Linux Mint 22.2. There are also improvements from the new Debian 13 based too such as APT 3.0 with the new Solver3 dependency resolver and new /tmp behavior that store temporary files in RAM for better performance.
Once the ISO has been approved for release, it will filter out to the various download mirrors and then we should get an official announcement from Linux Mint’s Clem Lefebvre with the download links and instructions on how to upgrade for LMDE 6 to 7.
Source: Linux Mint