Fedora 45 Post-Install Guide: Everything You Need to Set Up a Perfect System

Fedora 45 is out, and it ships with a freshly updated kernel, a polished GNOME 48 desktop, and plenty of under-the-hood improvements. But right after the installer reboots, there are a handful of things you will want to do before you actually start using the system day-to-day.

This guide walks through everything — from the first dnf command you should run, to setting up RPM Fusion, getting proprietary codecs, enabling Flatpak, installing NVIDIA drivers, and tweaking the desktop. No bloat, just the stuff that matters.

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1. Update the System First

Before anything else, pull in the latest package updates and kernel patches.

sudo dnf upgrade --refresh -y

If a new kernel was installed, reboot to load it:

sudo reboot

After reboot, update your firmware as well. Many laptops and some desktops have firmware updates available through fwupd:

sudo fwupdmgr refresh --force
sudo fwupdmgr get-updates
sudo fwupdmgr update

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2. Speed Up DNF

Fedora’s package manager is solid, but it can feel slow on the first run after a fresh install. Open the DNF configuration file and add these two options:

sudo nano /etc/dnf/dnf.conf

Add to the bottom of the [main] section:

max_parallel_downloads=10
fastestmirror=True

This tells DNF to download up to 10 packages at once and pick the fastest available mirror. Save and close the file. You will notice the difference immediately on the next upgrade.

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3. Enable RPM Fusion Repositories

Fedora, by design, only ships free and open-source software in its default repositories. This means no H.264 codec, no proprietary drivers, and no ffmpeg with restricted format support right out of the box.

RPM Fusion fills that gap. It is split into two repositories — free (open-source but not part of Fedora’s guidelines) and nonfree (proprietary software). Enable both:

sudo dnf install \
  https://mirrors.rpmfusion.org/free/fedora/rpmfusion-free-release-$(rpm -E %fedora).noarch.rpm \
  https://mirrors.rpmfusion.org/nonfree/fedora/rpmfusion-nonfree-release-$(rpm -E %fedora).noarch.rpm

Then update the AppStream metadata so your software center picks up the new repositories:

sudo dnf update @core

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4. Install Multimedia Codecs

Fedora ships a restricted version of FFmpeg called ffmpeg-free that strips out H.264 and H.265 support due to US patent law. Once RPM Fusion is enabled, you have two ways to fix this.

Option A — Install libavcodec-freeworld (Recommended)

This adds the missing H.264/H.265 decoders on top of the existing ffmpeg-free without replacing any system libraries. It is the cleanest approach:

sudo dnf install libavcodec-freeworld

Option B — Replace ffmpeg entirely

If you want the full ffmpeg binary for encoding, streaming, or conversion tasks:

sudo dnf swap ffmpeg-free ffmpeg --allowerasing

GStreamer plugins for GNOME apps

GNOME Videos, Rhythmbox, and other GTK apps rely on GStreamer. The default plugins only handle open formats. Install the full set:

sudo dnf update @multimedia --setopt="install_weak_deps=False" --exclude=PackageKit-gstreamer-plugin

OpenH264 from Cisco

Cisco pays the patent licensing fees for a specific H.264 implementation and distributes it for free. You can enable it as an additional fallback:

sudo dnf config-manager setopt fedora-cisco-openh264.enabled=1
sudo dnf install mozilla-openh264 gstreamer1-plugin-openh264

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5. Set Up Flatpak and Flathub

Fedora 45 includes Flatpak by default, but the Flathub repository is not added out of the box. Add it now:

sudo flatpak remote-add --if-not-exists flathub https://flathub.org/repo/flathub.flatpakrepo

Restart your session (or reboot) to apply the changes. After that, install apps directly from Flathub either through GNOME Software or the terminal.

Some useful apps to grab right away:

# Web browser
flatpak install flathub com.brave.Browser

# Communication
flatpak install flathub org.signal.Signal
flatpak install flathub org.telegram.desktop
flatpak install flathub com.discordapp.Discord

# Media
flatpak install flathub org.videolan.VLC

# Development
flatpak install flathub com.visualstudio.code

# Flatpak permission manager
flatpak install flathub com.github.tchx84.Flatseal

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6. Install NVIDIA Drivers

The open-source Nouveau driver that ships by default with Fedora does not support CUDA, hardware video decoding, or proper gaming performance. Here is how to install the official NVIDIA driver from RPM Fusion.

[!IMPORTANT] Make sure RPM Fusion nonfree is enabled before running these commands (covered in Step 3).

Install the kernel module and CUDA libraries:

sudo dnf install akmod-nvidia
sudo dnf install xorg-x11-drv-nvidia-cuda

After installing, wait at least 5 minutes before rebooting. The akmods service builds the kernel module in the background. Rebooting too early will result in a black screen or fallback display mode.

Verify the driver loaded correctly after reboot:

nvidia-smi

Hardware-accelerated video decoding with NVIDIA

sudo dnf install libva-nvidia-driver

For gaming with Steam or Wine (needs 32-bit support too):

sudo dnf install libva-nvidia-driver.{i686,x86_64}

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7. Hardware Acceleration for Intel and AMD GPUs

If you do not have an NVIDIA card, you still want hardware-accelerated video decoding for smooth 4K playback and reduced CPU load.

Intel (Gen 8 / Broadwell and newer — 2015 and later)

Covers Skylake, Kaby Lake, Coffee Lake, Tiger Lake, and Intel Arc:

sudo dnf install intel-media-driver

Intel (Gen 7.5 / Haswell and older — 2014 and earlier)

Covers Haswell, Ivy Bridge, Sandy Bridge:

sudo dnf install libva-intel-driver

Not sure which generation your CPU is? Check with:

lscpu | grep "Model name"

AMD GPUs

Fedora’s default Mesa build removes H.264/H.265 hardware decode support for legal reasons. Swap in the freeworld versions from RPM Fusion:

sudo dnf swap mesa-va-drivers mesa-va-drivers-freeworld
sudo dnf swap mesa-vdpau-drivers mesa-vdpau-drivers-freeworld

For 32-bit support (required for Steam and Wine):

sudo dnf swap mesa-va-drivers.i686 mesa-va-drivers-freeworld.i686
sudo dnf swap mesa-vdpau-drivers.i686 mesa-vdpau-drivers-freeworld.i686

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8. Enable and Verify the Firewall

Fedora ships with firewalld active by default. You can verify this with:

sudo firewall-cmd --state
sudo firewall-cmd --get-default-zone

The default zone is FedoraWorkstation, which blocks unsolicited incoming connections while allowing outgoing traffic. This is a sensible default — leave it as is unless you have a specific reason to change it.

To allow a specific service, for example KDE Connect for phone-to-PC sync:

sudo firewall-cmd --permanent --add-service=kdeconnect
sudo firewall-cmd --reload

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9. Install Microsoft Font Alternatives

If you regularly open documents created on Windows — Word files, PowerPoint presentations — the fonts will look wrong unless you install compatible replacements. Google created metric-compatible substitutes for the two most common Microsoft fonts:

• Carlito replaces Calibri
• Caladea replaces Cambria

sudo dnf install 'google-carlito-fonts' 'google-caladea-fonts'

These are drop-in replacements that preserve the same character spacing, so documents will look nearly identical to how they appear on Windows.

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10. Set Up Gaming

Fedora is a solid gaming platform. Getting it configured properly takes just a few commands.

Install Steam

sudo dnf install steam

Inside Steam, go to Settings → Compatibility and enable Steam Play for all titles. Select the latest Proton version. This lets you run most Windows games through the Proton compatibility layer without any extra work.

Install Lutris

Lutris manages non-Steam games, GOG titles, Epic Games, and other storefronts:

sudo dnf install lutris

MangoHud — In-game Performance Overlay

MangoHud overlays FPS, GPU usage, CPU temperature, and frametime directly inside any Vulkan or OpenGL game:

sudo dnf install mangohud

To enable it for a Steam game, add this to the game’s launch options:

mangohud %command%

GameMode

GameMode temporarily applies performance tweaks when a game is launched — disabling power saving, boosting the CPU governor, and requesting performance mode from the GPU:

sudo dnf install gamemode

Add gamemoderun %command% to Steam launch options to enable it per game. You can combine both:

gamemoderun mangohud %command%

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11. Mount Additional Drives Permanently

If you have a secondary drive or partition you want available at boot, add it to /etc/fstab.

Find the UUID of the partition:

lsblk -f

Open /etc/fstab and add a line at the bottom:

UUID=your-uuid-here  /home/your_user/data  ext4  defaults,noatime,x-gvfs-show  0  0

Replace your-uuid-here with the actual UUID from lsblk -f, and /home/your_user/data with whatever mount point you want. The x-gvfs-show flag makes the drive appear in the GNOME Files sidebar.

Test the entry without rebooting to make sure there are no typos:

sudo mount -a

If no errors appear, the fstab entry is correct.

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12. Enable Magic SysRq — Emergency Reboot

Every Linux user eventually hits a full system freeze where the mouse stops, the keyboard does nothing, and the system is completely unresponsive. The Magic SysRq key gives you a way to safely reboot even in that state, without holding the power button and risking disk corruption.

Create the sysctl configuration file:

sudo nano /etc/sysctl.d/90-sysrq.conf

Add this line:

kernel.sysrq = 1

Apply it immediately without rebooting:

sudo sysctl -p /etc/sysctl.d/90-sysrq.conf

When your system freezes, hold Alt + SysRq (the Print Screen key on most keyboards) and type the following sequence, one key at a time, with a short pause between each:

R → E → I → S → U → B

The mnemonic to remember the order: Reboot Even If System Utterly Broken. The system will sync disks and reboot cleanly.

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13. Install Essential CLI Tools

A handful of terminal utilities that are genuinely useful every day:

sudo dnf install \
  htop \
  fastfetch \
  neovim \
  git \
  curl \
  wget \
  ripgrep \
  fd-find \
  ncdu \
  bat \
  unzip \
  p7zip \
  p7zip-plugins

What each one does:

Package	Purpose
htop	Interactive process viewer, better than top
fastfetch	System info display, modern neofetch replacement
neovim	Terminal text editor
ripgrep	Very fast grep replacement
fd-find	Intuitive find replacement
ncdu	Disk usage analyzer — shows what is eating your storage
bat	cat with syntax highlighting and line numbers
p7zip	Extract .7z, .rar, and other archive formats

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14. Clean Up

After setting everything up, remove unused packages and clear the package cache:

sudo dnf autoremove -y
sudo dnf clean all
flatpak uninstall --unused -y

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Done

Your Fedora 45 system is now properly configured for daily use. The non-negotiable steps are enabling RPM Fusion and installing codecs — without those, most video files and streaming sites with H.264 content will not play correctly. Everything else on this list is an improvement worth doing, not a strict requirement.

Got a question or ran into something that did not work on your hardware? Leave a comment below.