But the Ubuntu desktop does not come installed with Zorin OS, so I'm wondering if this has been installed separately or not. I seem to remember similar threads about this but I cannot find any right now.
We also need to explain why Wayland needs to be explicitly selected when it should be the default. If the laptop has an Nvidia card, maybe it can explain the fallback to X11. However, this wouldn't explain the layout shift, as Zorin OS works fine under X11, so we have two seemingly unrelated issues.
That's why I'd like to clarify if this is just a layout shift with one of the available options in Zorin Appearance, or does the Ubuntu desktop actually loads up for some reason.
From this comment, I gather that @craigbert has already gone through the user login window and select the Wayland option. I wonder if it's maybe disabled somewhere else; could you check this thread (in this case, to do the opposite)?