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I'm using libinput on my Ubuntu 16.04 , I am able to change some of the touchpad settings such as tap to click and natural scrolling, but I'm not sure how to change the cursor speed. I googled it and didn't find much help.

2 Answers 2

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You can set the cursor speed in two ways:

  1. Set an option in /usr/share/X11/xorg.conf.d/40-libinput.conf

On original 16.04, or 16.04.2 stack it is 90-libinput.conf.

The option is called "AccelSpeed". It is a float number between -1 and 1.

Example:

Option "AccelSpeed" "-0.5"

will make cursor slower.

  1. To test setting before you set it in the conf file you can use xinput command. Run it this way:

    xinput set-prop ID "libinput Accel Speed" -0.5
    

The ID is your touchpad ID in xinput output.

You can check props by

xinput list-props ID

The xinput setting is not persistent and will be reset after a reboot.

Note: The option in xinput is with space Accel Speed and there is no space in the conf file option AccelSpeed.

If you want to see what are other settings, refer to this manual:

http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/zesty/man4/libinput.4.html

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  • It worked, thank you. But I think you meant 90-libinput.conf not 40-libinput.conf
    – MichaelX
    Aug 23, 2017 at 16:11
  • It depends on X.org version. On older version it is 90, on the newer 16.04.3 HWE or 17.04 it is 40.
    – Pilot6
    Aug 23, 2017 at 16:53
  • I had to prepend libinput before the property. So a request that is working for me looks like xinput set-prop 13 "libinput Accel Speed" 0.7 (as my touchpad has the id 13. Sep 1, 2017 at 7:30
  • Oh, you are correct.
    – Pilot6
    Sep 1, 2017 at 7:37
  • I find it a bit weird that this is under /usr... I guess there has to be a way to add config files under /etc which override these?
    – smheidrich
    Dec 30, 2018 at 19:14
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In addition to the response above, I would recommend you configure these via a config file in /etc to avoid having your changes overridden by an Xorg update. One of the paths Xorg is looking for files is /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/. Simply add a new conf file in there. These load alphabetically, so make sure your file is called something like z-touchpad.conf to have your changes applied for sure.

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