Xfce Forum

HippopotamusMan

Member

Registered: 2026-01-18

Posts: 8

Cloning an XFCE4 configuration from one machine to another?

I have three different linux laptops running with XFCE4: two running Debian 13 and another one running LinuxMint 22.

I have spent a lot of time configuing my XFCE4 environment on one of the Debian 13 machines, and I'm wondering whether there's a way to clone that configuration to the other two machines. If so, that would save me a lot of configuration time on those two other systems.

I'm guessing that I just need to know which files and directories need to be copied over to the new machine in order accomplish this. Is that a correct guess?

vm_x

Member

Registered: 2024-02-12

Posts: 58

Re: Cloning an XFCE4 configuration from one machine to another?

It depends on what you mean by "configuring".

If you just clicked through the settings and entered your values, it should be as simple as copying the "/home/<username>/.config/xfce4/" folder.

If you did some special customizations in your themes etc, it's a bit more complicated.

Also note that Thunar, Mousepad, etc ... have configurations in their own respective folders. Take a look at the folders inside "/home/<username>/.config/" and see what needs to be copied over.

HippopotamusMan

Member

Registered: 2026-01-18

Posts: 8

Re: Cloning an XFCE4 configuration from one machine to another?

It depends on what you mean by "configuring".

If you just clicked through the settings and entered your values, it should be as simple as copying the "/home/<username>/.config/xfce4/" folder.

If you did some special customizations in your themes etc, it's a bit more complicated.

Also note that Thunar, Mousepad, etc ... have configurations in their own respective folders. Take a look at the folders inside "/home/<username>/.config/" and see what needs to be copied over.

Thank you very much. It's just settings and values, and I don't use Thunar. So it seems like the .config/xfce4 subdirectory would then be sufficient.