MAUI Is Coming to Linux

Alongside Avalonia 12 and the .NET 11 Previews, I am pleased to announce the first preview of our Avalonia backend for .NET MAUI. Now, you can leverage Avalonia to deploy .NET MAUI apps to new platforms, like Linux and WebAssembly.

Since last fall, we’ve made great strides in bringing the power of Avalonia to .NET MAUI. Beyond offering Linux and WebAssembly support for .NET MAUI, this new backend advances Avalonia’s vision of cross-platform consistency. There are many great reasons to choose between native and drawn UIs. Going native allows your app to blend in with your hosted platform. But there are times when you don’t want Liquid Glass and prefer a classic look. We want these apps to look and feel the same, regardless of the platforms you choose.

Get started in four steps

Eager to get started right away? Here’s how:

1. Create a .NET MAUI app.
2. Add the Avalonia.Controls.Maui.Desktop NuGet.
3. Add the net11.0 target framework.
4. Add UseAvaloniaApp to your MauiBuilder.

That’s it. Run the net11.0 target, and your app will launch. No need to create an Avalonia bootstrapper; we've already done that for you. Of course, you can extend or disable our source generator if you want full control on the Avalonia side.

Improving Avalonia for everyone

For us, this project was a great opportunity to introduce improvements to Avalonia itself. We wanted to close the gap between the control set available in .NET MAUI and Avalonia, to avoid needing to implement .NET MAUI-specific controls. One of the most obvious benefits of that work has been the creation of the new navigation APIs and controls we’re introducing with Avalonia 12. These, and countless other new features, are a direct result of our work supporting .NET MAUI.

How we tested

To test our new libraries, we’ve been porting existing .NET MAUI apps and developing new ones. Some you may have already seen, such as MauiPlanets or our 2048 implementation. These apps have been extremely useful in validating our work as we strive to meet or exceed parity with the original .NET MAUI versions. We also tested larger-scale apps like AlohaAI and MyConference, addressing issues like trimming, NativeAOT support, and CORS proxies for WebAssembly.

Native or drawn?

Running with both native and drawn controls is a good demonstration of what Avalonia offers .NET MAUI users. The native .NET MAUI version uses the operating system’s controls, making it appear more unified with the host OS. Meanwhile, Avalonia.Controls.Maui has a consistent look and behavior across all platforms. Both have their merits, but with Avalonia MAUI, you now have options.

WebView and GraphicsView

WeatherTwentyOne, a .NET MAUI sample app, works wonderfully on Linux and WebAssembly using our newly open-sourced WebView. Furthermore, if you built controls on top of .NET MAUI’s GraphicsView, they should work with our handlers with no surprises. We’ve also wrapped SkiaSharp.Views.Maui to allow dependent libraries like Mapsui to interoperate with Avalonia MAUI.

Looking ahead

While we’ve come a long way, there are still many areas to address. We have started work on a bespoke implementation of Maui.Essentials built on Avalonia. We’re also planning to enable interoperability with WinUI to host Avalonia controls within it. We are encouraged by the progress we’ve made as we move toward the general release of .NET 11.