(How) can I enable automatic switching between Intel and NVIDIA GPU?

drivers 16.04 nvidia intel gpu

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Unfortunately as of today automatically switching between the intel and NVIDIA graphics is still not supported on Linux based operating systems. There is some progress to be seen in GNOME 3.22, where it is possible to launch an application with the dedicated graphics adapter, but only when the open source drivers are in use. Maybe this feature will be available for the proprietary drivers in the future. In the meantime, for Ubuntu I recommend to use the default solution nvidia-prime and to remove bumblebee, because this software is not maintained any longer ... the latest version 3.2.1 was released on April, 26th in 2013 -> Bumblebee Version 3.2.1 "Tumbleweed" - Release Notes !

Example of GNOME 3.22 - most probably the version which will ship with Ubuntu GNOME 17.04 :

We will see how this will influence the development of other Ubuntu editions and graphics drivers.

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Abhishek Bhatia

"The purpose of computing is insight, not numbers."- Richard Hamming, 1961 Abhishek has had a unique interdisciplinary research exposure to AI systems. His projects range from designing artificially intelligent autonomous systems that operate in varied setups, all the way to studying common emergent phenomena in natural systems. He has published 5 research papers in the field of complex systems, artificial intelligence and statistical inference. He is currently working on Deep Reinforcement Learning applications for Natural Language Processing and General-game Playing. He is also enthusiastic about open-source tools and frequently contributes to many open-source projects.

Updated on September 18, 2022

Comments

Abhishek Bhatia over 1 year

I'm using a PC with an integrated Intel and a dedicated NVIDIA GPU. Is there a way to switch between the two graphics adapters automatically - depending upon the need at the moment?
Using the NVIDIA settings application forces me to log out and back in to perform the switch.

I found a similar question, but the answers are not sufficient enough. I installed bumblebee, but I don't want to specify the card each time when I run a program. Is there an automatical solution?
Muhamed Huseinbašić over 6 years

1. Is it still true that Linux-based systems don't have this automatic switch? 2. As I understood, this feature in gnome you are referring to, will only allow me to use dedicated graphics, but it will still be completely manual, I got it right?
cl-netbox over 6 years

@MuhamedHuseinbašić 1. Correct, there still is no automatic switch available in Linux. 2. When you use the open source nouveau drivers, you are using the intel graphics by default and you alternatively can launch an application with the dedicated graphics ... it is built-in and works out-of-the-box. When you install the NVIDIA drivers, you are always running the dedicated graphics chip. Tools like bumblebee are more or less a "hack".
WinEunuuchs2Unix over 6 years

+1 please revisit in 6 months or so with a status update.
Rodriguez almost 5 years

Is this still the state of the art on the matter?
cl-netbox almost 5 years

@Rodriguez : Switching between intel and NVIDIA automatically is still not supported on Linux systems.