# Wayland

Wayland is a modern display protocol and architecture that replaces the aging X11 system on Linux. It defines how applications communicate with the display server to render graphics and handle input.

**🧩 Core Concepts of Wayland:**

Protocol, not a server: Wayland is a specification — it defines how clients (apps) and the compositor (display server) talk to each other.

Compositor = Display Server + Window Manager: In Wayland, the compositor handles both rendering and window management. Examples include:

- [Mutter (GNOME)](../desktop-environments/gnome.md)
- [KWin (KDE Plasma)](../window-managers/kwin.md)
- [Hyprland](../window-managers/hyprland.md), Sway, river, etc.

Direct rendering: Applications render their own graphics and hand them off to the compositor, reducing complexity and improving performance.