How to Fix Right Click Touchpad Not Working on Ubuntu and Other Linux Using GNOME

So you installed the brand-new Ubuntu system and are enjoying the shiny GNOME desktop when you suddenly realize that right click on your touchpad doesn’t work.

You might think that something is broken on your Ubuntu desktop but that’s not the case here. Nothing is broken here. In fact, it’s not a bug; it’s a feature.

Starting with Ubuntu 18.04, the right click behavior for touchpad has been changed. Actually, it is because the changes were made in GNOME 3.28 so this change impacts any distribution that uses the GNOME desktop environment. I have encountered it on Fedora and Arch Linux as well.

The solution could be as simple as running this command but read the article first to know what you are doing::

gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.peripherals.touchpad click-method areas

Let's see what you can do about getting the right-click behavior on Linux distros.

Method 1: Use two finger tap for right click

That's what distros want you to do. Most laptops these days do not provide dedicated left and right buttons anymore. This is why things have changed now.

Press the Super key (Windows key on most laptop) and look for settings. In the settings, go to Mouse & Touchpad and then click on the Touchpad tab.

In here, scroll down a bit until you see the "Tap to click" section. Enable this.

After this setting is enabled, a single tap will work as left click. To emulate right click, just use two fingers and tap them anywhere on the touchpad. The fingers should tap simultaneously.

At the bottom of the touchpad, you'll see the option to test settings.

Trust me. This is much better than opening another application to check if left and right click are working the way you want.

Method 2: Use bottom left and right click touchpad buttons

While two finger tap is quite handy, not everyone has it in their muscle memory. Some people prefer the old ways of using the touchpad buttons. And why not? If your laptop touchpad has dedicated buttons, why not use them?

In the touchpad settings, you'll see the secondary clicking option.

It has the following two options:

Two finger push: This means you can use two finger and deep press anywhere on the touchpad to simulate a right click. Single finger deep push is for left click. I don't like this. The tap to click is better option for me as it deep pressing hurts my fingers.

Corner push: This is the old school way of deep pressing the bottom left corner for left click and bottom right corner for right click. This is what you would want if you want to use the dedicated left and right click buttons on your touchpad.

But even that doesn't work. What to do now?

It is possible that even choosing Corner Push settings doesn't really change a thing. Don't lose hope. The command line fixes it for you.

Open a terminal and enter the following command:

gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.peripherals.touchpad click-method areas

This will enable the bottom area of touchpad for clicking. Which means that pressing the bottom left of the touchpad will result in left lick and pressing the bottom right in right click.

This will also work along with tap to click method. You can go back to the finger method with:

gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.peripherals.touchpad click-method fingers

Or, you can let the system decide with the default value:

gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.peripherals.touchpad click-method default

This is what we used to do with the GUI tool GNOME Tweaks but of late, this option has been removed in the recent versions.

Using GNOME Tweaks to enable right click at the bottom (old method...may still work in older versions)

You need to install GNOME Tweaks tool first. It is available in Ubuntu Software Center.

Alternatively, you can install it using the command below:

sudo apt install gnome-tweaks

Once installed, press Super/Windows key to open the Application menu and search for ‘tweaks’. Click on Tweaks to start the program.

In the GNOME Tweaks, go to Keyboard & Mouse in the left sidebar and under Mouse Click Emulation section, select Area.

That’s it. I didn’t need to log out or restart here. You can immediately test it by clicking on the bottom right area and see that the right click is working fine again. If it doesn’t work immediately, you should restart your system.

The best thing here is that you can still use two fingers click for right click. You have both ways to do right-click now.

Note: As some readers have mentioned, if it doesn’t work immediately, first update and then restart your system.

Did it work for you?

I wonder why GNOME changed this behavior. Perhaps they think that two fingers tap is the correct way for right-click. In fact, even I haven’t used the bottom-right area of my touchpad for a long time. I am used to the two finger tap. Is it the new natural way of the ‘right click’ without the ‘right click button’? Maybe you could answer to that.

Anyway, I hope this quick tip fixed the right click issue with the touchpad on Ubuntu and other Linux. If you have any questions or suggestions, please feel free to use the comment section below.