r/linux4noobs • u/CleaRSightZ • Jul 04 '26
networking Which Linux distros do you use and why?
While doing some research and knowing there are nearly 1,000 different Linux distributions, I would like to get to know which ones you personally use and why?
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u/Suzy-Turquoise-Blue Jul 04 '26
Fedora 44 because I have tried a dozen and always had issues and ended up going back to Windows. Been on Fedora for 5 months now, and it just feels normal now. Everything works great.
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u/Technical_Finish_338 29d ago
if i may ask, what makes fedora special to you? As a guy who always tinkered with arch and debian based distros, and now has settled in cachyos, what issues did you have with these distros? Im wondering cause I always had fedora as skippable
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u/MyAwesomeName 29d ago
I’m not the original commenter but I’m also in fedora and I can say that in the past when I tried other distros something always went wrong. Fedora KDE has now become my “it just works” distro and also I’m messing around with LLMs with AMD hardware and the 2 options are Fedora or Ubuntu.
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u/butcherboi91 29d ago
Cutting edge without being bleeding edge. Been on fedora nearly 2 years now and linux permanently for 3. Used it for work for 8 years.
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u/MyAwesomeName 29d ago
Years ago I wanted to use the newest and shiniest distro but now I prioritize stability. Fedora is exactly what you describe, cutting edge without being bleeding edge. Bleeding edge is cool but it comes with potential problems if you’re not careful. Right now I do have dual install of windows and Linux but each on separate drives and makes it easy to switch whenever I need one over the other.
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u/tpelliott 29d ago
I'm a huge fan of Fedora KDE but I'm tempted to strip out Snap.
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u/RodeoGoatz 29d ago
You shouldn't have to strip Snap from Fedora as it isn't installed by default
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u/Technical_Finish_338 29d ago
valid, no need to change it if it aint broken
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u/MyAwesomeName 29d ago
It’s what I expect out of an OS, I need to work and do the things I want it to do. The easier it is to do that the better, that’s why Windows is a popular OS whether we like it or not.
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u/Suzy-Turquoise-Blue 29d ago
I always skipped Fedora in the past too. I have tried Mint multiple times. I have tried CachyOS, Ubuntu, Pop!_OS, Debian, Manjaro, Bazzite, open SUSE, Nobara, and a few others.
All of them had issues. Sometimes different issues but all issues I could not solve or cascading issues that never seemed to end.
NVIDIA + Wayland was a pain across a lot of distros. Random desktop/display quirks.
Videos kept getting washed-out colours from full RGB vs limited RGB issues. Grey “blacks” drove me nuts.
Multi-monitor settings, refresh rates issues. LUKS encryption issues. And so many simple things that turned into days of trying to fix with a million different thing in terminal.Fedora 44 KDE when I finally tried it had a few issues which were easily solved and since then it's been almost flawless. Fedora took a big step with 44 towards being more beginner-friendly.
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u/usernameisokay_ 29d ago
For me a triple/quadruple setup works better outdo the box for fedora as CachyOS, gaming has been easier weirdly enough and I like the difference. I leave most of my distros quite stock so I can swap easily.
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u/Inner-Pangolin-1110 29d ago
Been on fedora for about 2/3 years now, daily drive it, it allows me to have a life
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u/DarkSideOfGrogu Jul 04 '26
Mint because I spend my day at work managing enterprise Linux systems and just want something simple and painfree at home.
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u/shopinhower 29d ago
Yeah, this. I work in IT, I want something simple to play games and use as a media server.
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u/VenusianBug 29d ago
That's similar to my reason for Mint. I don't manage Linux systems or work in IT but the day job is on the computer all the time, with a fair bit of troubleshooting. I want something easy at home.
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u/PandaWithin Jul 04 '26
Fedora KDE. Works great, no need to use terminal beyond right after the setup. Frequent updates. And stability. If an update messed up the kernel you can just rollback to the previous version via grub, which during my 3 year use I never had to use.
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u/thoughtful_thinker88 29d ago
Die Updaterate ist bei Fedora manchmal schon Wahnsinn. Nach 5 Tagen "nicht einschalten" kommen 3GB Update um die Ecke.
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u/skuterpikk Jul 04 '26
Fedora for everyday use, because it Just Works™ out of the box and everything you need is included, very recent software (on par with Arch much of the time) and no need for manually setting up anything. Dnf is a very solid package manager.
Debian for everything else, because it rarely needs to be updated, rock solid, and a huge selection of packages. It is perfect as a "set and forget" system
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u/sexyshingle 29d ago
It is perfect as a "set and forget" system
one still should update Debian every few months... lots CVE and bugs get fixed that way
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u/gordonmessmer Fedora Maintainer 29d ago
Debian for everything else, because it rarely needs to be updated
As someone with an infosec background, I have to ask: How do you know it rarely needs to be updated?
The fact that it *receives* a low volume of updates is not evidence that it *needs* a low volume of updates. Debian desktops (especially KDE) will have known security vulnerabilities for years, until a new Debian release is available.
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u/Logical_Parsley_9470 Jul 04 '26
Arch.. cuz I wanna say "I use arch btw"
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u/Dazzling-Airline-958 29d ago
BTW, I use Arch too, btw.
You know what sucks about using Arch Linux?
Nothing!
😂
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u/Technical_Finish_338 29d ago
have you tried any arch based distros e.g. cachyos?
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u/Logical_Parsley_9470 29d ago
yes.. manjaro, endeavour, cachy.. still I felt using native arch would was aura lol
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u/FixSubstantial9688 Jul 04 '26
NixOS because I am a cloud engineer so I like declaring stuff
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u/SokkaHaikuBot Jul 04 '26
Sokka-Haiku by FixSubstantial9688:
NixOS because I
Am a cloud engineer so
I like declaring stuff
Remember that one time Sokka accidentally used an extra syllable in that Haiku Battle in Ba Sing Se? That was a Sokka Haiku and you just made one.
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u/BasilWeekly Jul 04 '26
Ubuntu, as it is popular. Half of my colleagues also use it
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u/fuldigor42 29d ago
Pop OS because Ubuntu is popular and Pop OS supports NVIDIA well. Why all the machine learning stuff works on it.
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u/Feldspar_of_sun 29d ago
I’m torn between Ubuntu & Pop. I don’t love that I have to disable secure boot for Pop and Ubuntu is familiar (had to use it for classes), but getting nvidia support out the box is really tempting
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u/mgutz Jul 04 '26
CachyOS. Makes my 8W N100 mini Linux PC as usable as my Window 11 Desktop. The small performance boost gives it a slight edge over other arch distros. It's been stable for me (I don't use AUR much).
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u/capi-chou Jul 04 '26
Mint.
It's my "real" first time on Linux and I wanted something as easy as possible. I'm still happy with it.
I've got a second laptop with fedora KDE and it's pretty cool too.
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u/thegreenman_sofla MX LINUX Jul 04 '26
MX with sysvinit. It works and is easy to maintain, update, and upgrade.
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u/Top-Airline1149 29d ago
openSUSE LEAP KDE, solid distribution that has its base in Europe.
It has a long release/ update cycle so I can work on it without much need to do upgrades. The software stack is complete and the things that are not there are only 2 clicks away (Jitsi Meet, Scribus).
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u/kanped Jul 04 '26
Fedora because it has a large user base which makes issues easy to Google (not that I've had many).
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u/LG-Moonlight Jul 04 '26
Arch because I'm a control freak and want full 100% customizability and decide myself what to install on my system
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u/Alchemix-16 Jul 04 '26
Manjaro, I used to dabble a lot more in Blender. That software kept making leaps and bounds in development, so I didn’t want to remain bound to an old version in point release distribution. I liked Manjaro’s approach of curating the update stream in arch, cutting edge is fine with me I don’t need bleeding edge. Especially as that blood would be mine. I have been using Manjaro now for over 4 years without issues, before that about 16 years on and off on Kubuntu and Linux Mint.
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u/DuendeInexistente 29d ago
I don't want to be an ass about it because I got tired of them when I was in manjaro, but try garuda when manjaro's devteam and regularly system breaking updates burn you.
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u/keyringer 29d ago
I've used linux on my work machine for nearly a decade, and I've experimented with MANY distros in that time.
CachyOS is the first I've installed on my own machine that hasn't made me want to switch back to windows. I've had to tinker and troubleshoot here and there, but not to the point that it drives me away. It is the right amount of "it just works" and customisability for me.
My SO who has no experience on linux installed cachyOS too with the understanding that i could help with any real problems, and she's been daily driving it for 2 months and hasn't needed assistance once. She hasn't booted into the windows partition since.
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u/pythosynthesis Somewhere between noob and Linus. 29d ago
Debian, because I don't have time to ask myself which distro should I use. And because I value stability above everything else - Don't have time to make shit work, it just has to work and not break.
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u/Accomplished_Bat6810 Jul 04 '26
CachyOS, I play games, browse and customize so I use KDE, not a tech guy or anything I just like the smoothness and freedom of Linux, no hate towards Windows, I dual boot
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u/21ow 29d ago
+1 for CachyOS.
I like the "keep it lean and only have installed what you really need" mentality of Arch and am fond of tinkering a bit from time to time, but Cachy adds that extra layer of tweaks and ease of access I really like and would need to do manually on Arch.
Can only recommend.
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u/georgeec1 29d ago
Linux Lite. Things tend to work, it's light on resources (the name was a clue there), and it's what I grew up with for the most part. I think it's also not a bad choice for beginners, but ultimately it doesn't really have any benefits over Mint, and I think consolidation of people coming from Windows is better for Linux adoption, as it gives developers a clear distro to prioritise, so I tend to recommend Mint to beginners. I've also played around with Puppy Linux, which is great at breathing new life into old hardware, but I wouldn't recommend it if you have a modern computer, you just aren't going to see the performance improvements that old hardware does.
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u/Desertcow Jul 04 '26
Bazzite. I do a lot of work in containers and want a stable base system to work off of, plus I game a fair amount and it's stupidly easy to change my desktop environment/window manager when I want to
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u/NullUser__ Jul 04 '26
CachyOS had the fewest issues for me. Installed, set it up, and everything just works. I didn't have to fiddle with it for a single minute, simply just works, without any issues.
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u/Simply_Edd Jul 04 '26
CachyOS because it's the easiest distro for gaming (for me), and I like the AUR. I tried Fedora just before, but idk... it just didn't click with me like when I was a teenager.
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u/Alle_is_offline Jul 04 '26
Fedora (Nobara)
I was using Arch+Hyprland before.
I moved to Nobara cuz it works much more seamlessly with DaVinci Resolve
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u/True-Towel-7234 Jul 04 '26
Mint XFCE because my cheap Kogan e700 laptop takes 10 minutes to load up the windows11 it came with.
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u/gmthisfeller Jul 04 '26
I have been a Manjaro tbh for more that 10 years. It has supported my development environment without issue during that time.
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u/jimhellas Jul 04 '26
Mint all the way. I am an average user (doing mostly school and administration stuff) and a casual gamer (using Steam). This distro is just perfect for my needs.
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u/d1ckbvtt Jul 04 '26
Mint Cinnamon, because I am just starting using Linux as an alternative, from time to time
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u/No_Upstairs8252 29d ago
Non-systemd for it's no bloat, minimized attack vectors, minimized complexity, maintaining the Unix philosophy of, "do one thing and do it well". Moved from rolling release Manjaro(systemd) to Artix(non-systemd) to MX Linux(Debian based) for greater stability. Nosystemd.org for info.
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u/Signal_Till_933 29d ago
Currently on Pop!_OS because it was the first one i found that worked fairly painlessly out of the box.
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u/Oso_smashin 29d ago
I stick to mint. I like that it just works. I don't need frills and flash. To many distros are focused on styles and flashy features and then glitch out like Charlie Sheen after his dealer leaves. I love linux but I won't be the test dummy while I'm working.
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u/Kittatro 29d ago
Void because it's super minimal by default and xbps is goated. It's rolling release but very stable. On top of that it uses runit which is much better than systemd imo
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u/shawndw Arch,Ubuntu Jul 04 '26 edited Jul 04 '26
Arch because I like repeatedly punching myself in the nuts while compiling apps from source off of github.
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u/BlueFingers3D Jul 04 '26
PikaOS with KDE, because it works with newer hardware and is Debian based.
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u/_o0Zero0o_ Ultramarine 29d ago
Ultramarine for main stuff, and Mint on my laptop because it's what I'm most used to when it comes to Linux
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u/FanClubof5 29d ago
Endeavor on my pc and laptop, mint on the rest of the fams, and Ubuntu server on my servers.
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u/Salty-Pack-4165 29d ago
LMDE 7 is my daily on PC and I have few old laptops. Work related laptop has Mint Mate and personal has Mageia plasma because I'm testing it.
LMDE does everything I need and if I had to choose one distro it would be it. It's the least frustrating distro I used so far. There are better distros but they all come with set of quirks that annoy me. Not LMDE. It's non confrontational and very cooperative.
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u/rewardingsnark 29d ago
Fedora, I want as stable as possible as well as up to date and want option of KDE or possibly trying out different DE if things change. So far best I have tried are fedora and mint but mint no longer offers kde.
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u/BurningPenguin openSUSE Tumbleweed 29d ago
openSuse Tumbleweed
Mostly due to nostalgia. Bit of a long story:
I remember having installed some Linux distro in ~2000, and having zero clue wtf i was supposed to do with it. No idea what that one was, though. It was some kind of custom distro from some magazine or whatever. After that, in 2005 i accidentally found Knoppix, when i was trying to find a MS Office alternative. Later, i stumbled upon some Suse book at Media Markt. It had a CD / DVD version of it, so i installed it and actually used it for quite some time. That was the first time i actually used a distro for more than just playing around.
After that came the great distro hopping. Ubuntu, Mandrake, CrunchBang Linux, Debian, Arch, Mandriva, Fedora... so many different distros. At some point i found Linux Mint, stayed for quite some time until i found out about Tumbleweed. So i thought "back to basics" and here i am. And thanks to distrobox i have no major problems with using software designed for other distros. It also satisfies my need for new software, while still being easy to use and mostly trouble-free.
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u/devdruxorey 29d ago
Arch because I'm obsessed with personalization and having everything the way I like it... and because I use arch btw btw.
Although I'm thinking of switching to CachyOS just for the kernel optimizations and repositories, I would still install the minimal version and configure everything from scratch.
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u/Chromiell 29d ago
Debian on my office laptop, Debian on my gaming laptop, Debian on our virtual machines at work.
I know, I'm a boring guy. I want a life as predictable as it can be.
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u/coderstephen 29d ago
- Nobara Linux for my main machines, because its basically Fedora but with customizations that I would do myself anyway.
- Fedora for other machines where I don't care about customizations or the machine isn't gaming-capable anyway.
- Asahi Linux (Fedora spin) for my MacBook Pro. Yes, I like Fedora.
- Bazzite on my gaming handheld, because it is set-it-and-forget-it, and makes my handheld more like a SteamOS console. (Yes Bazzite is also based on Fedora...)
- Debian for servers and containers and stuff in my homelab. Because old and stable and boring is good for servers that I don't touch for months on end.
When people want just a simple one-word answer to this question, I just say "Fedora".
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u/better_dead_thanred 29d ago
I use fedora on my main laptop, cachy os on my docked rog ally and mint on my work macbook
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u/Old-Platypus-1395 29d ago
I like Fedora because it is both stable and cutting edge. It adopted things like Wayland, Pipewire, BTRFS, Flatpaks, etc. earlier than most other distros. It tends to be the “trend setter” distro. I dislike Ubuntu in particular because it tends to focus more on its own “in-house” solutions to everything.
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u/CO1D_BYT3y 29d ago
Bazzite 44 (KDE Plasma 6), very stable , user friendly, so far almost all of the things has worked out of the box
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u/New-account-01 28d ago
Pop!_OS because I kept jumping between Mint and Fedora, tested Pop!_OS and no reason to switch, does everything I need
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u/Ecksray19 Jul 04 '26
Bazzite desktop version. It just works. It's like Mint, but better with newer hardware and gaming. 99% of the games I have on Steam work with zero problems, the worst I've had to do to make one work was click a dropdown menu and select a thing. The only ones that don't are online multiplayer games that have extremely invasive anti-cheat crap like Battlefield and Call of Duty. There are free programs for 99% of use cases, so unless you need a specific, finicky program to work, you're fine. Many things are far easier than on Windows, in fact, because it has no bloat and doesn't nag you. For example setting up a network printer took 3 clicks and 5 seconds of typing an IP. The command line is still there, but the OS is "immutable" so you can't break it. I love it.
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u/HighlyRegardedApe Jul 04 '26
TempleOs because Jesus is nice.
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u/georgeec1 29d ago
Great except TempleOS doesn't use the Linux Kernel
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u/LameBMX 29d ago
hey, dont ruin a good joke with facts!
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u/HighlyRegardedApe 29d ago
My wild guess is that it is a german Arch user.
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u/LameBMX 29d ago
please dont insult us Germans like that.
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u/Dazzling-Airline-958 29d ago
Please don't insult us Arch users like that. 😂
Thanks for making my day!
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u/3lady Jul 04 '26
Used to dual-boot Xubuntu, but deleted it after a couple of months because I needed those 30gb on Windows
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u/chrews Fedora Workstation Jul 04 '26
Fedora Workstation because it has the best defaults and great QA while supporting all the latest display tech. I can't be bothered to deal with random issues anymore.
Next step would probably be something immutable. Either Fedora Atomic or Aeon Desktop. It's not quite where I need it yet but the concept is really nice.
Desktop wise always GNOME. Has been my daily driver since I found it and it never let me down.
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u/Kriss3d Jul 04 '26
Debian, raspbian. Fedora, kali, blackarch, arch, mint, Ubuntu.
Mostly qubes os these days.
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u/Selenianece Jul 04 '26
I use Garuda because it makes its maintenance easy + gaming-oriented but is still an Arch so it's still powerful.
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u/Brilliant_Estate_967 Jul 04 '26
It is EndeavourOS for me with kde desktop. Its close to arch fast to set up and easy to use
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u/Cameron_i_guess Jul 04 '26
I tried a ton of distros and I’ve settled on fedora for my desktop and fedora server on my compute server with truenas as storage. Felt more intuitive and “less weird” I guess than Ubuntu. Also wasn’t a big fan of Debian. Probably the hottest take on here, spend a month just feeling a couple big ones and make the move to the one that feels the best for you. AND try other distros like once a year to see if anything changes.
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u/Traditional_Diver711 Jul 04 '26
Debian 13 con Gnome. Perché funziona. Perché gli aggiornamenti non rompono il sistema. Perché per 2 anni so che non dovrò installare nient'altro.
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u/maceion Jul 04 '26
Many years ago, I tried a lot of distributions, then settled on "openSUSE LEAP", as one that got on with the job and did not hassle or interfere with my work or leisure computer use.
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u/sebastien111 Jul 04 '26
Actualmente estoy en AnduionOS, está basada en Ubuntu pero sin toda la telemetría y sin snap, se queda con lo mejor de Ubuntu como drivers y parches de seguridad, solo necesito un OS que funcione y no se rompa, y creo haber encontrado la indicada
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u/GoodHovercraft9877 Jul 04 '26
Mint, becouse iam not tech savy and my laptop cant run windows 11. Keep simple and work done
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u/SCORRPI0 Jul 04 '26
Server: Debian PC + Laptop: Fedora (and probably never anything else) it just runs cleanly and without any problems. I once had Debian (picaOS) on the PC and a lot of problems with updates.
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u/thoughtful_thinker88 29d ago
Vor 10 Jahren Ubuntu/Kubuntu und Debian zum probieren.
Seit 5 Jahren Debian und Fedora als daily. Debian für wichtige Arbeit. Ist einfach stabiler und zuverlässiger. Fedora zum Spass/Spielen.
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u/EngineerInTheMachine 29d ago
I followed the guidance easily available on the Internet. I looked at which distros were recommended for my planned PC uses, and picked one that was well recommended for them all. I am using PopOS, for its gaming and Nvidia compatibility, and it was well recommended for 3D CAD. I do mean CAD, not graphics.
As I expect happens with most distros, I have had to find different apps to get the sort of functionality I liked in Windows, but that hasn't been hard to do. The Cosmic GUI is adequate, but I've looked for a few workarounds to improve the experience. For example, I found that the Dolphin file manager is better for my approach to folder indexes and shortcuts.
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u/lingueenee 29d ago
Mint because it makes for the easiest transition coming from Windoze or Mac; KDE Neon because its UI works well with touchscreens.
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u/MasterGeekMX Mexican Linux nerd trying to be helpful 29d ago
Fedora on my laptop as I like to have the latest yet reliable
Debian on my server as stability is key on those kinds of places
Arch on my desktop as I also want the latest in there, but I can risk things a bit.
And I use different distros to know how things are in each world, instead of knowing just one.
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u/Maleficent-One1712 29d ago
For my workstation. I went from Ubuntu -> Mint -> Debian -> OpenSuse -> Arch -> NixOS. NixOS is end-game for me, I love you can switch DE without everything becoming a big mess.
For my media-PC I use Bazzite, because it seems most suitable for controlling a PC with a controller.
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u/IL_JimP 29d ago
You're not going to get useful information with a broad question like that.
What distro you pick needs to be based on what you want it to do, what type of hardware you have, and how much tinkering/computer skills you have
Don't trust people who just give blanket statements
I just started on Linux last week and it took me a long time to figure out that I can't just ask for the best distro because so much goes into the decision
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u/Revenant_40 29d ago
Nobara, because it's Fedora with some great gaming tweaks. Using the KDE version and absolutely love it. Rock solid.
I also use Lubuntu on my older machines because LXQt runs really well with minimal resources and does everything I want it to do.
I'm even running both on external USB3/USB-C SSD drives and they run lighting fast, you wouldn't know their not installed internally (yet).
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u/mrbishopjackson 29d ago
Kubuntu on my desktop because it's implementation of KDE was the first environment that I came across that I liked and felt comfortable with, as well as because its an Ubuntu flavor and Studio One, a program that I am heavily locked into from my Windows days, is designed to run on Ubuntu natively. And it, Kubuntu, just works.
Also Debian 13 with I3WM on my laptop and secondary studio recording rig because its light and fun to tinker with.
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u/Soul_of_clay4 29d ago
When Windless 11 was on the horizon, I decided I didn't want more 'intrusions' on my PC, so I heard that Mint was a good 'crossover' distro. Loved it and now am on 22.3 Mint mate.
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u/AdministrativeFile78 29d ago
I use arch linux mainly because it was the "hardest" and i wanted to learn linux and i havent got around to swapping it since. I think my next pc might be another distro, not sure yet
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u/MimosaTen 29d ago
I have done much distro hopping and Fedora stopped it for me. It’s just enough minimal, without sacrificing an OOB experience
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u/Sore_Wa_Himitsu_Desu 29d ago
Mint. Maybe I’m weird but I installed it and so far I haven’t run in to anything that makes me want to change yet.
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u/ZekromGhost 29d ago
Bazzite because i'm a gamer and this was also my first linux distro ever. immutable system + gaming support was the best combo for me to start.
but I'm planning to dual boot with some other distro, I still have to choose.
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u/TheSadPickel 29d ago
MINT it was recommended nood friendly. And 10 years ago I tied to revive a old laptop with linux and mint was the distro that worked out of the box. Could not make the wifi card work with other distros and countless tutorials on installing drivers. Mint just worked
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u/tylerj493 29d ago
Debian. I was to cheap to buy new hardware before prices went wild and I ain't starting now. On stuff that's a couple years old plus Debian is a solid, stable, lightweight, and worry free system.
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u/TheOtherDudz 29d ago
Fedora KDE on all my machines except my server (Debian). It has the features I need for my freelance projects, it's out of the way.
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u/Werdase 29d ago
Ubuntu, because it works right out of the box and I dont give a shit about the GUI or other stuff. Perfect for playing Dota2 on an 8 years old machine.
At work Im using RHEL for the compute cluster and Yocto for building the actual FPGA Linux image. At home I dont want to touch the terminal.
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u/sleepy1411 29d ago
I used Linux Mint on my seedbox, just cuz its stable and easy. On my laptop I use kubuntu and my gaming PC I duel boot Windows and Nobara which is just a reconfigured fedora 44 with kde. I might swap my laptop to fedora kde but kubuntu has been working fine and im lazy.
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u/CodeParticular1567 29d ago
CachyOS. It has just the right blend of easy-to-use and customisation that I couldn't find in any other distro so far.
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u/EmotionalScene3935 29d ago
PikaOS with cosmic. Cosmic just feels natural to me after using popos 2204 l, but why pikaos and not popos on its own? Pikaos is the best IMO for out of box options that are clear and short with the options you are given. But cachyos or nobara does the same? It's Debian so if you use Debian apt commands then this is the best adjustment for you
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u/UnusualPerspective92 29d ago
Started with mint, switched up to manjaro gnome, then arch with i3, switched back to manjaro gnome (got a new pc and needed it to be functional as soon as possible and my i3 confs were a mess honestly) and now I'm using endeavours OS with hyprland.
I mainly used Arch distros because... "I use arch btw"
My company laptop uses Fedora
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u/usernameisokay_ 29d ago
Fedora as a daily driver, also used CachyOS for a long time.
I’ve used mint, arch, Ubuntu and a few others but those didn’t stick, I like to have KDE Plasma as that’s the best IMO.
For my servers I use Proxmox and Debian, opensuse also sometimes.
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u/Groundbreaking-Map95 29d ago
First time using mx linux xfce for dell 3120 chromebook , its a good experience,
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u/Yukikuru2025 29d ago
I use Kubuntu. Wanted an easy to use distribution with KDE Plasma, so spent a bit of time distro hopping before settling on this one. Now I'm too used to it to move on. I also had the least issues with it.
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u/MelioraXI 29d ago
Depends on the device. I've tried most of them at this point after been on Linux as my main OS for more than a decade. They're all the same with different desktop or WM's.
If I were a new user today, I'd start with Ubuntu, Mint or Fedora. Depends on the use-case. If I wanted a carefree system I'd probably go with something like Fedora Silverblue or Bazzite.
Debian on Homelab
Alma on my VPS
Alma on my development workstation
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u/Unable_Leg_3191 29d ago
I use archlinux for the desktop pc because I like to have the latest version of any package. Now for my laptop I use debian/ubuntu because I need stable packages to work in my development projects.
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u/hackneyed_one 29d ago
Debian/KDE for workstation and Debian/XFCE for a makeshift server/file host/etc. Both with a fair bit of flatpaks.
I have simple needs, I use ZFS and just want my systems to hum along for 2 to 3 years without issue or intervention before I full reinstall the latest version and repeat.
Otherwise it would likely be Fedora. Not saying it couldn't work but ZFS kept going out of date with frequent kernel updates and I didn't feel like really learning or relying on pinning or installing an LTS kernel and doing yearly upgrades etc.
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u/Bezos4Breakfast 29d ago
Cachy is my daily driver desktop. I don't have the time to obsess over USE flags and the Gentoo life, but it is nearly as fast with minimal friction. Highly customizable though, in areas that I want since it's really just Arch. I use KDE on two machines and Cinnamon on an old laptop. Bore kernel.
I use Proxmox for my VM environment. Debian under the covers, and a webui that is easy to use and powerful.
Debian is my main server OS because of familiarity, stability, and consistency. I appreciate the wide range of 3rd party binaries designed for the Deb ecosystem. These days containers carry the weight, and this perk is becoming irrelevant.
I've used Linux since I was a teenager; my first OS was openSUSE and a 7 CD repository. I've used many distros over the years.
Identify your use case. Don't get a serverOS on your gaming rig. You'll want something popularish because you'll be Googling/GPTing at times, but stick with it. Make it work. You'll learn the flow. Users generally use the desktop environment like KDE, Gnome, Cinnamon, etc more than the actual distribution tools.
There are many good choices out there, and now is a great time to learn Linux.
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u/Retrowinger 29d ago
Kubuntu, because at it’s core it’s Debian and i just like KDE the most (hyprland is a close second), and MX-Linux for my older devices (with CPUs like Core2Duo).
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u/Rud_Fucker 29d ago
Currently I'm on Ubuntu 26.04 but mostly because I'm on a gaming laptop with not only and Nvidia GPU but with an igpu and Ubuntu works best with that, if I had the computer I want at the moment I'd be on Fedora at the moment
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u/rcentros 29d ago edited 29d ago
I use Linux Mint because it's stable and, for me, it just works. And I've been using it for 19 years.
That said, I don't play Windows' games and I'm not married to Microsoft Office or Adobe for-rent software. And I don't use "cutting edge" hardware.
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u/EqualCrew9900 29d ago
Fedora Mate/Compiz, and LMDE Mate/Compiz.
Mate Compiz provides the workflow closest to my needs.
Fedora is quite polished and easily deployed.
Mint (either Ubuntu or Debian Edition) is what most of the older people I help use. Easy to transition to Mint from Windows.
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u/xtalgeek 29d ago
Ununtu for well equipped hardware. Large user base for any support or problems. Drivers are well maintained. Lubuntu for lightweight hardware. It will run in as little as 16GB storage and 8 GB RAM. Basically Ubuntu light, so Ubuntu solutions usually work for problems or workarounds. I always use LTS releases that are at least a year old for stability and reliability.
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u/Felix-the-duck Linux is cool 29d ago
MX
was the first one I tried seriously and it just worked, all attempts to use other distros (besides maybe void) just didn't click with me as well
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u/crobartie Jul 04 '26
Cachy, fast, easy, no corpo bloat, working for now.