How to Change Mouse Wheel & Touchpad Scroll Speed in Ubuntu 20.04/22.04/Debian 11

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Want to change the mouse wheel or touchpad two finger scroll speed in GNOME? Here’s how to do the trick in Ubuntu and Debian Linux.

GNOME desktop does not have a configure option to set scroll speed in system settings (aka gnome-control-center). Though, an issue has been created 2 years ago to request the feature in Gnome development page.

For the desktop session on Xorg, there’s a good command line tool “imwheel” can do the job. Though, there’s no good alternative for Gnome Wayland so far.

NOTE: This tutorial is tested and works on Ubuntu 20.04, Debian 11,  and Ubuntu 22.04 on Xorg (or app runs as XWayland) in my case.

Step 1. Install imwheel:

First, search and open ‘terminal’ window from Activities overview screen.

When terminal opens, run command to install imwheel package:

sudo apt install imwheel
Tip: The package is also available in Fedora, openSUSE, Arch Linux repositories.
Install imwheel on Ubuntu/Debian based systems

Step 2. Create config file:

After installed the tool, run command to create a configuration file:

gedit ~/.imwheelrc

For Ubuntu 22.10+, replace gedit with gnome-text-editor, or use nano that works in most Linux.

The command will create and open the ‘.imwheelrc‘ file via gedit text editor. When it opens, paste following lines:

# Speed up scrolling and pass unchanged for zoom and side buttons
".*"
None, Up, Button4, 4
None, Down, Button5, 4
Shift_L, Up, Shift_L|Button4, 4
Shift_L, Down, Shift_L|Button5, 4
Control_L, Up, Control_L|Button4
Control_L, Down, Control_L|Button5
None, Thumb1, Alt_L|Left
None, Thumb2, Alt_L|Right

Here are descriptions for each lines:

  • The first line started with # is comment that does not function.
  • The “.*” tell to function for all apps. User may use something else, such as “^chromium$” to make it for chromium only.
  • The 3th and 4th lines started with “None”, set the scroll speed to 4. Change the number as you mind to increase or decrease the speed.
  • And, the next 4 lines configure the left Shift+ and Ctrl+ mouse scroll speed. In the case, “Ctrl+scroll” is left unchanged.
  • The last 2 lines tell the side buttons unchanged. Use may skip them if NO side buttons present.
scroll speed settings

Step 3. Verify:

After installed imwheel and setup the config file, now run imwheel command in terminal:

imwheel

Then open a web page and scroll either via mouse wheel or touchpad 2 finger gesture. If it works, go continue Step 4.

If NOT working properly, kill the process and re-configure the ‘.imwheelrc’ file via the previous step.

sudo kill -9 PID
NOTE: Running imwheel command will tell you the PID (Process ID) in terminal output.
Or run ps ax |grep imwheel to find it.

Step 4. Make ‘imwheel’ runs automatically on startup:

If everything is working OK, you may now make the tool starts automatically on startup. And, here’s how to do the trick by creating a user service.

  • Firstly, open terminal and run command to create “.config/systemd” folder: 
    mkdir ~/.config/systemd
  • Next, create a user subdirectory. It will output warnings if folder already exist. Just skip them. 
    mkdir ~/.config/systemd/user
  • Now, run command to create a service file under that directory and edit via gedit text editor: 
    gedit ~/.config/systemd/user/imwheel.service

When file opens, paste following lines for the service will start with 30 seconds delay.

[Unit]
Description=IMWheel
Wants=display-manager.service
After=display-manager.service

[Service]
Type=simple
ExecStartPre=-/bin/sleep 30
Environment=XAUTHORITY=%h/.Xauthority
ExecStart=/usr/bin/imwheel -d
ExecStop=/usr/bin/pkill imwheel
RemainAfterExit=yes

[Install]
WantedBy=graphical-session.target

Finally, enable this service via command:

systemctl --user --now enable imwheel.service

In next boot, user may check the “imwheel” status via command:

systemctl --user status imwheel.service

It should outputs ‘active (running)‘ in green indicates the service starts properly! Note: there are 30 seconds delay, so check it a moment later after login.

How to Restore:

For any reason, there are options to uninstall imwheel and restore the scroll speed. Firstly, open terminal by searching from ‘Activities‘ overview. Then, run following commands one by one:

  • Disable the imwheel service: 
    systemctl --user --now disable imwheel.service
  • Remove the service file: 
    rm ~/.config/systemd/user/imwheel.service
  • Uninstall imwheel via command: 
    sudo apt remove imwheel
  • And, clear the configuration file via command: 
    rm ~/.imwheelrc

That’s all. Enjoy!

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