French government says “au revoir” to Windows, will use Linux instead

The French government has officially committed to replacing Microsoft’s Windows operating system with Linux across all government desktops, stepping up its efforts to gain digital sovereignty.

The changes will affect 2.5 million of France’s civil servants.

The government requires every ministry to submit replacement plans by autumn 2026, covering collaboration tools, antivirus software, AI platforms, databases, and network equipment, according to 4ca.

Earlier this year, the French government ordered all departments to replace American video-conferencing platforms with the homegrown platform Visio, hosted on local servers, by 2027.

The government said that using too many tools weakens data security and creates strategic dependencies on external infrastructures.

“The aim is to end the use of non-European solutions and guarantee the security and confidentiality of public electronic communications by relying on a powerful and sovereign tool,” said David Amiel, the minister for the civil service and state reform.

France has already demonstrated a successful Linux rollout. The country’s national police force, the Gendarmerie, began replacing Windows XP with a customized version of Ubuntu Linux, called GendBuntu, in 2008, ZDNet reported.

The force cited the need to save costs, stating that Windows would cost €2 million more than GendBuntu each year to do the same job and yield the same results.

Striving for digital sovereignty

The move comes as an increasing number of European governments are abandoning US technologies for local open-source alternatives over concerns about data privacy and vulnerabilities arising from geopolitical tensions.

The ​German government announced in March that all public-sector documents will be issued only in open formats, excluding Microsoft Word and other proprietary formats.

Germany’s state Schleswig-Holstein said in 2025 that 80% of state government workplaces had switched from Microsoft software to open-source alternatives.

And the Austrian Armed Forces switched from Microsoft Office to the German office suite LibreOffice. This move will result in significant cost savings and strengthen the country’s digital sovereignty efforts.

Linux is a global open-source project founded by Finnish software engineer Linus Torvalds and is now developed by volunteers worldwide.

Vienna-based company LittleSnitch, which has exclusively served its network monitor tool for macOS customers, released a free version for Linux users earlier this week.

The company said that recent political events raised serious questions about dependence on foreign-controlled software.

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