Bottles ran Notepad++ and Paint.NET for the tasks tried in a test reported by How-To Geek, while three games had different problems. The setup used Ubuntu 26.04, Bottles installed through Flatpak, and the Soda runner.
Bottles manages separate Wine environments, called bottles, for running Windows software on Linux. In the reported test, opening a program did not always mean it worked well enough to use.
What happened with each app
| Application | Reported result |
| Notepad++ | Find and Replace, language modes, and multiple tabs worked. A 100-line macro paused the editor for a few seconds, then completed. |
| Paint.NET | Worked in a separate Application bottle. |
| Plants vs. Zombies | Launched very slowly. Ubuntu became unresponsive afterward, and the author forced a restart. |
| Purble Place | Launched and its mini-games were playable, but some text was blurry or missing. Installing fonts and changing display scaling did not fix it. |
| HoloCure: Save the Fans | The installer failed in both the regular Games bottle and the UMU setup tried. |
The outcomes are specific to these applications in the Ubuntu 26.04 setup reported by How-To Geek. In particular, Plants vs. Zombies launched but was too slow to use, while Purble Place ran with text-rendering problems.
What to check in Bottles’ installer list
Bottles’ installer documentation describes compatibility grades of Bronze, Silver, Gold, and Platinum, based on installer test results. An installer can also declare its architecture. When it does, a Win64 bottle will not show a Win32 installer, and a Win32 bottle will not show a Win64 installer.
Those are two useful checks when choosing an installer: look at its grade, then make sure its declared architecture matches the bottle. A bottle is a separate environment configured for a particular use, such as Application or Games.
Check the bottle’s architecture as well as the installer’s grade: an architecture mismatch can keep an installer out of the list entirely.
What UMU does outside Steam
Bottles describes UMU as providing the Steam Linux Runtime and the environment Proton expects outside Steam. That explains the role of the option in the HoloCure attempt; How-To Geek reported that the game’s installer failed in both the regular Games bottle and the UMU setup it tried.
