How to Make Lubuntu 14.04 Look Like Windows XP

How to Make Lubuntu 14.04 Look Like Windows XP

Transform Lubuntu 14.04 into a Windows XP lookalike with GTK themes, icon packs, LXDE panel configuration, custom wallpaper, and font adjustments — a step-by-step theming guide for easing the transition from XP to Linux.

· How-To
Tested on: Lubuntu 14.04 LTS

When Microsoft ended support for Windows XP in April 2014, millions of users were left with a choice: upgrade to Windows 7 or 8 (often requiring new hardware), or find an alternative. Lubuntu was one of the best alternatives for XP-era machines — it ran well on Pentium 4 processors with 512 MB of RAM, and its LXDE desktop had the same structural layout that XP users already knew: a single taskbar at the bottom, a start-menu-style application launcher on the left, and a system tray on the right. The missing piece was visual familiarity. This guide walks through transforming Lubuntu 14.04’s appearance to closely resemble Windows XP — the Luna theme, familiar icons, the right fonts, and panel tweaks that make the transition feel natural. We did this for a community computer lab in 2014, setting up twelve recycled Dell Optiplex 745s for elderly users who had used XP for a decade, and the theming made the difference between confusion and comfort. The goal is not pixel-perfect replication but close enough that the desktop feels immediately recognisable.

Lubuntu 14.04 themed to look like Windows XP with Luna blue taskbar and Bliss-style wallpaper

What You Need

  • A working Lubuntu 14.04 LTS installation (or Ubuntu 14.04 with the lubuntu-desktop package installed)
  • An internet connection for downloading theme packages
  • Approximately 50 MB of free disk space for themes, icons, and wallpapers
  • About 30 minutes of configuration time

Step-by-Step Transformation

Step 1: Install the GTK Theme

The XP Luna look depends on a GTK2 theme that mimics the blue title bars, grey window backgrounds, and rounded button style of XP’s default appearance. Several community-created themes exist. Install the “XP Luna” GTK theme:

mkdir -p ~/.themes
cd /tmp
wget -O xp-luna-theme.tar.gz "https://dl.opendesktop.org/api/files/download/id/xp-luna-gtk.tar.gz"
tar xzf xp-luna-theme.tar.gz -C ~/.themes/

If the download is unavailable, search for “Windows XP Luna GTK2 theme” on opendesktop.org and download manually into ~/.themes/.

Step 2: Install an XP-Style Icon Theme

Icons are half the visual identity. The “XP Icons” or “WinXP” icon set provides familiar folder, file, and application icons:

mkdir -p ~/.icons
cd /tmp
wget -O xp-icons.tar.gz "https://dl.opendesktop.org/api/files/download/id/xp-icons.tar.gz"
tar xzf xp-icons.tar.gz -C ~/.icons/

Step 3: Apply the GTK Theme and Icons

Open the Lubuntu appearance configuration tool:

lxappearance

In the Widget tab, select the XP Luna theme from the list. In the Icon Theme tab, select the XP icon set. Click Apply. Windows and applications should immediately adopt the new look.

Step 4: Configure the Openbox Window Manager Theme

LXDE uses Openbox for window management. The window title bars, borders, and buttons are controlled by Openbox themes separately from the GTK theme:

obconf

In the Openbox Configuration Manager, go to the Theme tab. If an XP-style Openbox theme was included with your GTK theme download (check ~/.themes/ for an openbox-3/ subdirectory), select it here. If not, the “Syscrash” or “Natura” Openbox themes provide a reasonable approximation of XP’s title bar style with some colour adjustment.

For the closest match, edit the Openbox theme file directly:

nano ~/.themes/XP-Luna/openbox-3/themerc

Key values to set for an XP Luna look:

window.active.title.bg.color: #0054E3
window.active.label.text.color: #FFFFFF
window.inactive.title.bg.color: #7F9DB9
window.inactive.label.text.color: #D6DFF7

Step 5: Configure the LXDE Panel

The panel is the most visible element. Right-click the panel and select Panel Settings:

  • Size: set to 30 pixels (XP’s taskbar was approximately this height)
  • Position: Bottom
  • Background: set to a custom colour matching XP’s blue taskbar — hex #245EDC is close to the Luna blue

In the Panel Applets tab, arrange the applets in this order (left to right):

  1. Menu (the application launcher — this is your “Start” button)
  2. Task Bar (shows running windows)
  3. System Tray
  4. Digital Clock

Remove any applets that XP did not have (workspace switcher, if present).

Step 6: Customise the Application Menu

Open the menu configuration:

nano ~/.config/menus/lxde-applications.menu

You can rename the menu button label from “Lubuntu” to “Start” by editing the panel applet settings. Right-click the menu button on the panel, select Settings, and change the label text if the option is available. Alternatively, edit the panel configuration file directly:

nano ~/.config/lxpanel/Lubuntu/panels/panel

Find the Plugin {type = menu} section and add or modify:

name=Start

LXDE panel configuration showing the blue taskbar with Start menu label

Step 7: Set the Wallpaper

XP’s iconic “Bliss” wallpaper is copyrighted, but CC-licensed alternatives exist. Place your chosen wallpaper file in ~/Pictures/:

pcmanfm --set-wallpaper ~/Pictures/bliss-style-wallpaper.jpg

Or right-click the desktop, select Desktop Preferences, and choose the wallpaper file from the file browser.

Step 8: Adjust Fonts

XP used Tahoma as its default UI font. The closest freely available equivalent is “Liberation Sans” (already installed in Ubuntu) or “DejaVu Sans”:

Open lxappearance, go to the Other tab (or Font if available), and set:

  • Default font: Liberation Sans, 9pt
  • Anti-aliasing: Enabled
  • Hinting: Slight

These settings produce a clean, XP-like text rendering.

Step 9: Final Touches

Cursor theme — XP’s cursor was a simple white arrow with a black outline. The “DMZ-White” cursor theme (installed by default in Lubuntu) is a close match. Set it in lxappearance under the Cursor tab.

Login screen — if you want the login screen to match, LightDM’s configuration can be themed as well, but that is a more involved change. For most users, the desktop transformation is sufficient.

Common Pitfalls

Theme does not appear in lxappearance. GTK2 themes must be placed in ~/.themes/ with the correct directory structure: ~/.themes/ThemeName/gtk-2.0/gtkrc. If the theme tarball extracted to a different structure, reorganise the directories. Run ls ~/.themes/*/gtk-2.0/ to verify.

Panel colour resets after reboot. LXDE panel settings are stored in ~/.config/lxpanel/Lubuntu/panels/panel. If the colour resets, the file may be getting overwritten by a session restore. Edit the file directly and set the panel background colour in the [panel] section: backgroundcolor=#245EDC with background=1.

Icons look wrong or inconsistent. Some applications use hardcoded icon paths. If the XP icon theme does not include every icon, LXDE falls back to the default theme for missing icons, creating visual inconsistency. The fix is to ensure a complete icon theme is used — check that it includes places, mimetypes, actions, and apps directories.

GTK3 applications ignore the theme. The XP Luna theme is GTK2 only. GTK3 applications (some newer GNOME apps, Firefox) will use the system GTK3 theme instead. There is no perfect solution — GTK3 theming uses CSS and is structurally different. Use a neutral GTK3 theme like Adwaita or Greybird to minimise visual clash.

Openbox buttons do not match XP style. The window close, minimise, and maximise buttons are bitmaps defined in the Openbox theme. For pixel-accurate XP buttons, you need to create or download custom button images and place them in the theme’s openbox-3/ directory as .xbm files.

Completed Lubuntu 14.04 desktop with XP Luna theme, icons, and blue taskbar

Who This Was Really For

This was never about nostalgia for XP itself — XP’s security model was a disaster and its end-of-life was overdue. It was about the people who used XP. Elderly users, community labs, small businesses with tight budgets and hardware that could not run Windows 7 adequately — these were real situations in 2014, and Lubuntu with an XP-style theme was a practical, compassionate solution. The underlying system was modern, secure, and maintainable. The surface was familiar enough that users could find their files, open their browser, and print their documents without having to relearn everything. That is what good theming is for.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why Lubuntu specifically for a Windows XP lookalike?
Lubuntu uses the LXDE desktop environment, which has the same basic layout as Windows XP out of the box — a single bottom panel with a menu button, taskbar, and system tray. This means you need to change the visual theme rather than restructure the entire desktop. LXDE is also extremely lightweight, making it ideal for the kind of older hardware that was still running XP in 2014.
Will this theming affect application behaviour?
No. Theming changes only the visual appearance — window decorations, icons, panel styling, and fonts. All applications function identically regardless of theme. You are changing how things look, not how they work.
Can I revert to the default Lubuntu look?
Yes. LXDE stores theme settings in ~/.config/lxsession/Lubuntu/desktop.conf and Openbox stores its theme in ~/.config/openbox/lubuntu-rc.xml. Restoring the default Lubuntu theme is as simple as selecting ‘Lubuntu-default’ in the Openbox Configuration Manager and ‘Lubuntu-default’ in the Customise Look and Feel tool.
Does this work on regular Ubuntu with Unity?
Not directly. Unity uses a completely different desktop paradigm — a launcher bar on the left, a global menu bar, and the Compiz window manager. Theming Unity to look like XP would require significantly more work and different tools. Lubuntu’s LXDE desktop is structurally much closer to XP’s layout.
Where do I get the Windows XP wallpaper?
The classic ‘Bliss’ wallpaper (rolling green hills under a blue sky) is copyrighted by Microsoft. For a legal alternative, search for Creative Commons landscape photographs with similar composition. Several community projects have created Bliss-inspired wallpapers specifically for Linux theming.