Liquorix Linux has officially shipped kernel 7.2-6, though the release is defined less by what it adds and more by what it strips away. Just 20 hours after introducing the ambitious Project-C custom scheduler, maintainer Steven Barrett pulled a full revert to restore stability to the v7.2.3 upstream base. The rapid four-version sprint from September 3rd to 5th suggests the new scheduler introduced regressions severe enough to warrant an immediate rollback. Users running Debian, Ubuntu, or Arch on AMD64 can still grab the patched kernel via the official install script or distro repos, with Project-C expected to return once the code clears a cleaner testing pass.

Liquorix 7.2-6 Kernel Drops Its Flagship Project-C Scheduler After 24-Hour Rollercoaster

Liquorix Linux has officially shipped its latest kernel release, version 7.2-6, and the headline feature is what isn't there. The project's highly anticipated Project-C scheduler has been completely reverted, scrubbing a full day's worth of development from the codebase. Maintainer Steven Barrett made the call just 20 hours after the scheduler first appeared in release 7.2-5.

If you were planning to benchmark Project-C against the mainline scheduler this weekend, grab a coffee instead. The 7.2-6 tag marks a clean rollback of all Project-C patches introduced in the preceding versions.

The Project-C Saga in Brief

The release timeline reads like a sprint that went off the rails.

Liquorix pushed four kernel versions in roughly one day, with each iteration tweaking the same scheduler subsystem. Version 7.2-3 landed on September 3rd with initial Project-C optimizations, including SMT balance skip logic and sync wakee placement. Version 7.2-4 arrived six hours later to refine those changes. Version 7.2-5 followed the next day with bug fixes.

Then came 7.2-6. The changelog entry is brief: "revert Project-C patches from 7.2-5." The final release undoes the previous three.

Four versions. One day. One full revert.

This signals that the Project-C implementation for the v7.2.x kernel line ran into issues severe enough to warrant an immediate rollback. Likely culprits include scheduler correctness problems, performance regressions on specific workloads, or stability issues under mixed loads that could not be resolved in time.

Project-C, also known as SCHED_ALT within Liquorix, is a custom proxy-execution scheduler built on top of the mainline Completely Fair Scheduler (CFS). It represents one of the project's most ambitious modifications. The goal was to improve task scheduling responsiveness for interactive workloads, reduce frame-time deviations in games, and provide better affinity-aware wake-up behavior on SMT architectures.

The patches that were pulled included SMT balance control adjustments, Proportional-Delay-Scheduler credit decay tweaks, and cache-aware placement optimizations. None of these made it into 7.2-6.

It's arguably the smartest move in kernel development this week. Rather than shipping a scheduler with known regressions, Barrett chose to revert entirely and return to the stable baseline of the upstream v7.2.3 scheduler plus the prior PDS and BMQ schedulers. Project-C isn't dead, of course. The revert applies specifically to the patches from the 7.2-5 series and by extension 7.2-3 and 7.2-4. Given that Project-C has been a recurring focus since at least mid-2025, it is likely being reworked for a future kernel version rather than abandoned.

Keep in mind that the revert only applies to the Project-C patches. The 7.2-6 release still includes all improvements from Linux v7.2.3 upstream, along with PDS credit decay fixes that predate the Project-C work. You're getting a stable, well-tested kernel. You're just not getting the experimental scheduler.

What You're Actually Getting

The 7.2-6 release is based on upstream Linux kernel v7.2.3. That brings a wealth of upstream improvements that you would miss if you were waiting for Project-C to land. The revert effectively returns the project to a known-good state, which is a relief for anyone who values stability over bleeding-edge features.

Not cheap? Well, it's free. The kernel is licensed under GPL-2.0. The project relies on community support and donations via Ko-fi for maintenance.

Installation and Ecosystem

Liquorix continues to support Debian Stable, Debian Testing, Ubuntu, and Arch Linux. The install script remains the quickest way to get set up.

curl -s 'https://liquorix.net/install-liquorix.sh' | sudo bash

However, at the same time, you need to know that the project only supports AMD64. The README explicitly states that AMD64 is the only architecture that will build successfully. If you are running x86 or ARM, this release is not for you.

The project maintains an aggressive release cadence, with updates appearing every one to four days during active development. This revert is a rare moment of humility in a project known for pushing patches to the limit. The Steam Machine launch was also a tale of patience, with Valve delaying shipping until 2026 after memory shortages forced a pricing review. Kernel projects don't usually face the same supply chain headaches, but the result feels similarly inevitable.

Head here to the GitHub release page for the full changelog and download links.