Download ThinkUtils

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For Lenovo ThinkPad laptops running Linux on x86_64 or ARM (aarch64). Built on Ubuntu 22.04 (glibc 2.35), so it runs on Ubuntu 22.04+, Debian 12+ and Fedora 36+.

Every release is installed into a clean container and launched under a virtual display before it ships — on Ubuntu 22.04 and 24.04, Debian 12, and Fedora 41, on both architectures, on real hardware rather than emulation — with a screenshot checked by OCR to confirm the interface actually rendered.

Fan control is x86_64 only

On ARM ThinkPads (the X13s and similar) everything works except fan control. That is a kernel limitation, not an app one: fan control goes through thinkpad_acpi, which is an x86 platform driver and does not exist on ARM.

Battery charge thresholds, CPU governor, power profiles and system monitoring all work normally — the app detects the missing fan interface and says so rather than appearing broken.

Debian / Ubuntu.debFedora / RHEL.rpmAny distroAppImage

# Debian / Ubuntu — the glob matches whichever architecture you downloaded
sudo apt install ./thinkutils_*.deb

# Fedora / RHEL
sudo dnf install ./thinkutils-*.rpm

# AppImage — portable, nothing to install
chmod +x thinkutils_*.AppImage
./thinkutils_*.AppImage

Use apt install ./file.deb, not dpkg -i

apt pulls in the WebKit and GTK libraries ThinkUtils needs. dpkg -i does not, and leaves you resolving them by hand.

Ubuntu APT repository

For automatic updates through apt:

echo "deb [trusted=yes] https://gh.vietanh.dev/ThinkUtils/apt ./" \
  | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/thinkutils.list
sudo apt update
sudo apt install thinkutils

What [trusted=yes] means

[trusted=yes] tells apt to install without verifying any signature. HTTPS still authenticates the server for the duration of the download, but nothing proves the packages are the ones our CI built — and ThinkUtils installs a helper that runs as root.

It is needed because the currently published repository is unsigned. A signing key is now configured, so the next release will publish a signed repository and these instructions change to the ones below.

If you would rather not take that trade in the meantime, download the .deb from the releases page and install it with apt install ./thinkutils_*.deb. You give up automatic updates and check for new versions yourself.

From the next release: verified installs

Once a signed release is published, https://gh.vietanh.dev/ThinkUtils/apt will carry InRelease, Release.gpg, and the public key. Switch to:

curl -fsSL https://gh.vietanh.dev/ThinkUtils/apt/thinkutils-archive-keyring.asc \
  | sudo gpg --dearmor -o /usr/share/keyrings/thinkutils-archive-keyring.gpg

echo "deb [signed-by=/usr/share/keyrings/thinkutils-archive-keyring.gpg] https://gh.vietanh.dev/ThinkUtils/apt ./" \
  | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/thinkutils.list

sudo apt update
sudo apt install thinkutils

signed-by= scopes the key to this one repository, so it cannot vouch for packages from anywhere else in your sources. The repository's own index page always shows whichever form is currently published — it is generated from what the release actually produced, so it cannot disagree with reality.

Maintainers: see apt-signing.

Before fan control works

One step is not optional, and it is the most common reason people think the app is broken. The thinkpad_acpi kernel module refuses every fan change unless it was loaded with fan_control=1:

echo 'options thinkpad_acpi fan_control=1' \
  | sudo tee /etc/modprobe.d/thinkpad_acpi.conf
sudo modprobe -r thinkpad_acpi && sudo modprobe thinkpad_acpi

The app detects this and offers to do it for you on the Fan Control page. It is worth knowing why granting permissions alone cannot fix it: the setting is a kernel module parameter, fixed at load time, so no amount of privilege changes it while the module is running.

Reboot if the reload fails — the module is often held open by something else.

Ubuntu 22.04 will still ask for your password

Ubuntu 22.04 ships polkit 0.105, which Debian and Ubuntu patched to ignore JavaScript rule files. That is the mechanism ThinkUtils uses to grant passwordless fan control, so on 22.04 every fan change prompts for a password. Everything works; it is just not silent. Upgrading the distribution is the only fix.

Which ThinkPads are supported

Fan control needs the thinkpad_acpi kernel module, which covers most ThinkPads from the X, T, P and L series. To check before installing:

ls /proc/acpi/ibm/fan && echo "supported"

Dual-fan machines — P1, P15, X1 Extreme and similar — are supported, and both fans are reported. The firmware drives them together, so they cannot be set to different speeds; that is a hardware limitation, not an app one.

Battery thresholds, CPU governor and system monitoring work on any Linux laptop. Only fan control is ThinkPad-specific.

Building from source

git clone https://github.com/vietanhdev/ThinkUtils.git
cd ThinkUtils
npm install
npm run tauri build

Packages land in src-tauri/target/release/bundle/. See the development guide for the toolchain you will need.