- Favorite distro: Debian
- Also favorite distro: Arch
- First distro: Red Hat Linux 5.1 (not RHEL!).
- Honorable mention: Slackware for most of the 00s
this post was submitted on 15 Jul 2026
298 points (96.0% liked)
linuxmemes
32107 readers
1526 users here now
Hint: :q!
Sister communities:
Community rules (click to expand)
1. Follow the site-wide rules
- Instance-wide TOS: https://legal.lemmy.world/tos/
- Lemmy code of conduct: https://join-lemmy.org/docs/code_of_conduct.html
2. Be civil
- Understand the difference between a joke and an insult.
- Do not harrass or attack users for any reason. This includes using blanket terms, like "every user of thing".
- Don't get baited into back-and-forth insults. We are not animals.
- Leave remarks of "peasantry" to the PCMR community. If you dislike an OS/service/application, attack the thing you dislike, not the individuals who use it. Some people may not have a choice.
- Bigotry will not be tolerated.
3. Post Linux-related content
- Including Unix and BSD.
- Non-Linux content is acceptable as long as it makes a reference to Linux. For example, the poorly made mockery of
sudoin Windows. - No porn, no politics, no trolling or ragebaiting.
- Don't come looking for advice, this is not the right community.
4. No recent reposts
- Everybody uses Arch btw, can't quit Vim, <loves/tolerates/hates> systemd, and wants to interject for a moment. You can stop now.
5. 🇬🇧 Language/язык/Sprache
- This is primarily an English-speaking community. 🇬🇧🇦🇺🇺🇸
- Comments written in other languages are allowed.
- The substance of a post should be comprehensible for people who only speak English.
- Titles and post bodies written in other languages will be allowed, but only as long as the above rule is observed.
6. (NEW!) Regarding public figures
We all have our opinions, and certain public figures can be divisive. Keep in mind that this is a community for memes and light-hearted fun, not for airing grievances or leveling accusations. - Keep discussions polite and free of disparagement.
- We are never in possession of all of the facts. Defamatory comments will not be tolerated.
- Discussions that get too heated will be locked and offending comments removed.
Please report posts and comments that break these rules!
Important: never execute code or follow advice that you don't understand or can't verify, especially here. The word of the day is credibility. This is a meme community -- even the most helpful comments might just be shitposts that can damage your system. Be aware, be smart, don't remove France.
founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
arch btw
Nice meme! Its interesting that you've tried more than one distro. Personally, I prefer to pick the best one right away and stick with that. I think one of Zote's precepts mentions this. I use mint btw.
/jerk
Favorite: MX Linux
First Distro Used: Ubuntu 6.06
Distro You Want to Use in the Future: CachyOS
Honorable Mention: Pardus
Distro You Liked the Least: Mandriva
Distro You Currently Use: Bazzite
The Distro You Used for the Longest Time: Opensuse
Kubuntu FTW !
Ubuntu -> Mint.
I don't know why I'd change, Mint just works. That's all I ever wanted.
Same, really. I keep trying other distros, and have Kubuntu on my laptop right now, but it's still just a tiny bit too buggy compared to Mint.
I always come back to Mint. Far from just a “beginner distro”, it’s a practical and solid choice for anyone devoted to something other than tweaking, perfecting, and personalizing an OS. Not that there’s anything wrong with that if it’s your passion and you have the time. Personally, I wouldn’t mind making my perfect Arch or NixOS setup, but my free time is limited and there is always something I’m interested in working on more.
All I ever wanted. All I ever needed. Heeeere , in my arms.
Words are very unnecessary
When I first saw "Distros i've used:", I thought there's no way I could list that, after my prolific distro-surfing phase between 2004 to about 2014... I don't know how many tall spools of CDs and DVDs I filled with distros, before I switched to usb, trying even more, with even less footprint to gauge it by.
... But, by just simply following the outline provided, I arrive at:
:)
That was fun.
uh... since when is SystemD a distro?
Fair query.
I was torn for which one distro I liked the least.
Considered something rpm based, but then realised all rpm based distros (bar two), I dislike to similar levels, and have thus not used them sufficiently to really say... and they also get lost amidst similar levels of dislike of distros I tried only ever so briefly in my distro-surfings.
Then I realised, the answer was obvious... my "liked the least"'ness has all systemd-imposing distros in a constellation, orders of distance further into "liked the least", more than any other criteria, and all so far out there, they're all as good as the same to my view. Rotten poison. Under an Embrace-Extend-Extinguish op. Centralising, homogenising, imposing, "the one true way" dogma. Beyond just a single point of failure, already compromised from within, agnogenic, dependency-generating, disempowering. and many more reasons.
So that's how I arrived at [any distro imposing] systemd as my least liked distro.
This should be a stance that makes sense when considering in context that my fave/current and longest used, are bedrock & gentoo. I like choice. And so, any distro that's striven to not facilitate user's freedom to choose, and even striven to make the ability to choose harder, has fallen into that same homogenising "one true way"-dogma gestalt. Obediant copy-pasta distrod can Foxtrot Oscar.
... Could have done a wayland logo there too [or GNOME3, lol]. XD But I have less experience with that. Perhaps (as in the third link of reasons^), I could have used the term "FLOS", but then that would have been more obscure and misleading. ... And [even if interpreted correctly] perhaps a mite more broad than best depicts my "liked the least", throwing a few which I like more, under the bus.
Anyhoo...
Reasoning elaboration [for my latteral-thinking lazy-cheat cop-out gestalt criteria choice] aside,
The distro I want to use in the future's far more interesting...
Favorite: Debian
First Distro Used: Ubuntu 10.04
Distro You Want to Use in the Future: CachyOS
Honorable Mention: Fedora
Distro You Liked the Least: Post-Snap Ubuntu
Distro You Currently Use: Debian, Fedora, SteamOS
The Distro You Used for the Longest Time: Debian
Favorite is OpenSuse Tumbleweed. It's stable mostly, and quite fixable when it isn't. Just a great overall balance.
My first was actually DSL: "Damn Small Linux", contained entirely on a CD to remove a TERRIBLY resistant malware from my Windows XP machine. (It was awesome for that! Had no idea what I was doing lol.)
Tried Ubuntu, then Ubuntu Studio, but they didn't like my Wi-Fi devices back in those days, so I didn't get to do much with them!
Used Mint seriously on my aging laptop and loved it. It's such an excellent on-ramp and you can hang out with it as long as you like.
Later tried Manjaro for a while but...it started having some controversial project decisions and just didn't feel like home.
Using EndeavourOS on my gaming laptop and it works great! Considering migrating though: Arch is an excellent teacher, but I've had to spend unexpected weekends fixing weird hitches after updates.
Honorable Mention: Puppy Linux! I used to be able to boot it to any laptop from my Android phone, and that was a really neat trick for public computers and stuff.
Hey I resemble that journey. Very few people metion DSL and Puppy. Those lived on a multiboot flash drive I carry around "JIC" (these days I just bring Mint and Tails).
I just commented elsewhere how Mint became home - that "long as you like" is still going (jeez 8y at this point lol).
Cool! Yeah, they don't seem to be referenced as much anymore, but they were seriously impressive and had their use cases. :D
that "long as you like" is still going (jeez 8y at this point lol).
Yeah, Mint is often referred to by folks as a "beginner distro" implying you'll somehow inevitably skill up and distro hop, and sure, plenty do, but it really doesn't have to be that way!
(Heck, Eliot the super hacker in Mr. Robot used it as his home distro! Lol 😉)
I mean, it's stable, you can still get newer stuff and gaming via FlatPak, and it's just overall friendlier. The community is super helpful and nice too!
I personally jumped to OpenSUSE Tumbleweed because I like having new features sooner. (I blame Blender haha!), and honestly, I didn't expect to fall in love with KDE as much as I did. I really like KDE. :p
I'd always encourage people to try other distros just to see if they do something that fits them better or something, but yeah, you shouldn't feel any pressure to "graduate" from Mint. It's lovely. :D
Favorite is OpenSuse Tumbleweed. It’s stable mostly, and quite fixable when it isn’t. Just a great overall balance.
I am actually thinking that a stable-stable distro like Debian or OpenSuse Leap as a base system, and on top either GNU Guix or a VM with Tumbleweed or Suse Slowroll is a great option. Very stable for productivity, and at the same time very current for programming and exploring new stuff.
I currently use Debian stable, and both Gnu Guix and an Arch VM on top.
No CachyOS ? That is the best one
I've been seeing a lot of kbuntu on these images, what makes it so appealing to people besides kde instead of gnome?
I made the switch on my main pc (from Windows) to Kubuntu about 2 months ago. A friend had switched about a year before that and said it was fun to use so I tried it and it stuck.
I don’t see myself changing, it works. I don’t want a project, I want a computer I don’t have to think about. I actually enjoy using my pc again, feels like I’m back in early days when my computer did what I wanted it to do. Forgot what that was like. Anyway my upsides are not other distributions downsides, it’s just what I have now.
For context, in industry for 20 years, previous linux admin, dev and eng, I’ve used probably 15 distributions in my years, and I run a home lab server too.
It's stable and reliable.
Exactly that.
The desktop environment is the only difference between Ubuntu and most of its flavors.
Got into linux on the server side before I seriously looked at the desktop side. Run a mix of Ubuntu, Debian and what used to be CentOS but is now Almalinux in this space.
On the desktop started fiddeling with Ubuntu at first, but first distro I actually used was Mint. Tested a lot of them over the year, can't bothered to list them.
Mainly just use Fedora (KDE).
Fav distro: CachyOS
First distro used: Xubuntu
Distro I want to use in the future: BlendOS, seems cool. Though it's not Linux, I am interested in BSD.
Distro I liked least: toss between Debian and NixOS.
Distro used the longest: Arch variants, starting with Garuda for gaming.
Honorable mention: Ubuntu Studio (had to use it for some projects and I loved having all that I needed right away).
Current use: CachyOS for gaming, Fedora Kinoite for media servers, standard Fedora for small laptop.
All in all, I love Arch based distros, but I like to be well rounded. I've tried more than what I've mentioned, these are just what is relevant.
Favorite: NixOS
First Distro Used: Slackware
Distro You Want to Use in the Future: Silverblue, i didn't love redhat after the split off fedora, but I could stand to try another immutable
Honorable Mention: Arch
Distro You Liked the Least: Fedora
Distro You Currently Use: Nixos
The Distro You Used for the Longest Time: Debian
I really think Ubuntu is the most common first distro people try. A common reoccurrence here is the inability to see what an average person, in terms of tech literacy, knows and are willing to put time and effort into. Ubuntu has been the face of Linux for a long time (obviously not based on people who know and use linux). I wish Mint took that place as it's so much better.
I was gonna say that "and put effort into" is important.
I admin various Linux Servers, been through most distros at work and at home. I'm an experienced Linux admin/user. I'm settled on Mint at home for the foreseeable future.
After a long day/week/career doing IT, the last thing I want is for my primary PC to be a project-home. Mint Cinnamon ended up being the home I fell in love with - honestly was expecting it to be another kitchy distro that I would maybe reccommend for noobs (I mean it is also that). I couldn't be happier - LMDE is the only thing that makes me wonder about greener grass.
I haven't gotten to 95% perfect since Ubuntu pre-unity, and that one very long Arch build I did that one time. Even Debian, the home I grew up in, wasn't the home I wanted to live in forever.
No shade on any other Distros/DEs out there. Everyone has different homes and it's their home and I love that people have them and that they're all different, and I want many options to keep existing. Past me would not understand present me's choices.
Similar situation, experienced professional user but I’m running kubuntu at home. I just posted to another user about not wanting a project pc. I want to use my computer, not fix it or tweak it. It’s not other distributions are bad, it’s that this one is fine for me right now and it’s not windows.
I love Ubuntu currently but I'm planning on switching. I just love the feel of it.
I feel it. As a distro itself I'm not a huge fan of how it does things, but I really do like their theming, colors, font, aesthetic, logo, all that.
Thankfully easy enough to make any distro look like anything, with a little effort. :)
OpenSUSE got me onto Linux and was such a great option for a first distro. I still think about changing back sometimes. I'm surprised it doesn't get recommended more often.
load more comments
(6 replies)
view more: next ›