A display manager(DM) is a software component that manages sessions and presents a login manager to a user prior to starting a, in Xfce's case, a graphical window session.

There are numerous implementations of display managers. Presented here are five common DM's and some information on configuring them specifically for use with Xfce's Desktop Environment.

• LightDM
• LXDM
• SLiM
• GDM
• SDDM

LightDM is a lightweight, cross-desktop display manager.

Key features of LightDM are:

- Cross-desktop - supports different desktop technologies (X, Wayland, Mir, etc)
- Lightweight - low memory usage and fast performance
- Supports remote login (incoming: XDMCP and VNC; outgoing: XDMCP and pluggable)
- Supports guest sessions
- Has a comprehensive test suite

LightDM is the default display manager for Edubuntu, Xubuntu and Mythbuntu since 11.10 release, for Lubuntu since 12.04 release, for Kubuntu beginning with 12.10 until 15.04 for Linux Mint[14] and Antergos.

LightDM starts the X servers, user sessions and greeter (login screen).

LXDM is a lightweight X Display Manager. LXDM, originally the display manager of LXDE, is available in many distributions as an alternative Display Manager. Regarding the configuration, check the presence of a file (or add) /usr/share/xsessions/06xfce4.desktop (the location may differ depending on the distributions), such as:

[Desktop Entry]
Encoding=UTF-8
Name=Xfce4
Comment=Use this session to run Xfce4 as your desktop environment
TryExec=/usr/bin/startxfce4
Exec=/usr/bin/startxfce4
Icon=/usr/local/share/pixmaps/xfce4_xicon1.png
Type=Application

Lines TryExec and Exec may also differ between distributions.

SLiM(Simple Login Manager) is a lightweight Display manager that requires no Gnome or KDE dependencies and a more attractive interface than XDM

Features
- PNG and XFT support for alpha transparency and anti-aliased fonts
- Support of external themes
- Configurable runtime options: X server, login / shutdown / reboot commands
- Single (GDM-like) or double (XDM-like) input control
- Can load predefined users on startup
- Configurable welcome / shutdown messages
- Random theme selection

If you installed Xfce system-wide, and want to use the GNOME Display Manager to start your Xfce session, a .desktop file is required to configure gdm to start the Xfce session.

This is a sample desktop file, Xfce.desktop:

  [Desktop Entry]
  Encoding=UTF-8
  Name=Xfce4
  Comment=Use this session to run Xfce4 as your desktop environment
  Exec=/usr/local/bin/startxfce4
  Icon=/usr/local/share/pixmaps/xfce4_xicon1.png
  Type=Application

It is usually sufficient to copy the example file to the session directory used by gdm. This directory is usually located in /etc/gdm/, /etc/gdm3, /etc/X11/gdm/Sessions, /usr/share/xsessions, /usr/X11/share/gnome/xsessions. Consult your specific distribution documentation for details. gdm will need to be restarted after the .desktop file has been created.

Simple Desktop Display Manager (SDDM) is the successor and replacement of the KDE Display Manager(KDM).

Features:
- Supports X11 and Wayland
- Autologin
- Modern and prettified look
- DPI settings (HiDPI)
- Highly customizable
- Qt-based

The default configuration file for SDDM can be found at /usr/lib/sddm/sddm.conf.d/default.conf or /etc/sddm.conf.

  [...]
  [Autologin]
  User=<USERNAME>
  Session=Xfce.desktop
  Relogin=false

If you installed Xfce system-wide and you want to use the SDDM to start your Xfce session, you will have to create a .desktop file to configure SDDM to start the Xfce session.

Common locations are /etc/sddm.conf. Once you found the SDDM session directory, create a new file named Xfce.desktop with the following information:

  [Desktop Entry]
  Encoding=UTF-8
  Name=Xfce4
  Comment=Use this session to run Xfce4 as your desktop environment
  TryExec=/usr/local/bin/startxfce4 
  Exec=/usr/local/bin/startxfce4
  Icon=/usr/local/share/pixmaps/xfce4_xicon1.png
  Type=XSession

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