diff --git a/changelogs/fragments/6206-dconf-booleans.yml b/changelogs/fragments/6206-dconf-booleans.yml
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..92c4c930cb
--- /dev/null
+++ b/changelogs/fragments/6206-dconf-booleans.yml
@@ -0,0 +1,2 @@
+minor_changes:
+  - "dconf - be forgiving about boolean values: convert them to GVariant booleans automatically (https://github.com/ansible-collections/community.general/pull/6206)."
diff --git a/plugins/modules/dconf.py b/plugins/modules/dconf.py
index b5ece96ec1..9777102b0e 100644
--- a/plugins/modules/dconf.py
+++ b/plugins/modules/dconf.py
@@ -70,13 +70,18 @@ options:
     description:
       - A dconf key to modify or read from the dconf database.
   value:
-    type: str
+    type: raw
     required: false
     description:
       - Value to set for the specified dconf key. Value should be specified in
         GVariant format. Due to complexity of this format, it is best to have a
         look at existing values in the dconf database.
       - Required for I(state=present).
+      - Although the type is specified as "raw", it should typically be
+        specified as a string. However, boolean values in particular are
+        handled properly even when specified as booleans rather than strings
+        (in fact, handling booleans properly is why the type of this parameter
+        is "raw").
   state:
     type: str
     required: false
@@ -155,6 +160,7 @@ except ImportError:
     HAS_PSUTIL = False
 
 from ansible.module_utils.basic import AnsibleModule, missing_required_lib
+from ansible.module_utils.common.text.converters import to_native
 
 
 class DBusWrapper(object):
@@ -288,6 +294,10 @@ class DconfPreference(object):
 
         Returns True if the two values are equal.
         """
+        if canonical_value is None:
+            # It's unset in dconf database, so anything the user is trying to
+            # set is a change.
+            return False
         try:
             variant1 = Variant.parse(None, canonical_value)
             variant2 = Variant.parse(variant1.get_type(), user_value)
@@ -349,7 +359,7 @@ class DconfPreference(object):
         rc, out, err = dbus_wrapper.run_command(command)
 
         if rc != 0:
-            self.module.fail_json(msg='dconf failed while write the value with error: %s' % err,
+            self.module.fail_json(msg='dconf failed while writing key %s, value %s with error: %s' % (key, value, err),
                                   out=out,
                                   err=err)
 
@@ -401,11 +411,24 @@ def main():
         argument_spec=dict(
             state=dict(default='present', choices=['present', 'absent', 'read']),
             key=dict(required=True, type='str', no_log=False),
-            value=dict(required=False, default=None, type='str'),
+            # Converted to str below after special handling of bool.
+            value=dict(required=False, default=None, type='raw'),
         ),
         supports_check_mode=True
     )
 
+    # Try to be forgiving about the user specifying a boolean as the value, or
+    # more accurately about the fact that YAML and Ansible are quite insistent
+    # about converting strings that look like booleans into booleans. Convert
+    # the boolean into a string of the type dconf will understand. Any type for
+    # the value other than boolean is just converted into a string directly.
+    if module.params['value'] is not None:
+        if isinstance(module.params['value'], bool):
+            module.params['value'] = 'true' if module.params['value'] else 'false'
+        else:
+            module.params['value'] = to_native(
+                module.params['value'], errors='surrogate_or_strict')
+
     if Variant is None:
         module.warn(
             'WARNING: The gi.repository Python library is not available; '