Skip Navigation
Linux @programming.dev
TheMilk @lemdro.id

New to Linux which OS to use?

Finally making the transition from Windows to a Linux. I'm pretty sure it's been asked several times but which Linux OS would you recommend a beginner to use? I've seen Ubuntu and Mint as a good start. Not looking to do much. Game here and there (not too worried about Linux compatibility), streaming, editing videos. If I break any rules. I'm sorry.

167 comments

  • Linux is linux. In the end it's more your personal taste with just a little sprinkle of use case that decides.

    The main differences are:

    • Update speed: How quickly are the repositories getting updates. That's a spectrum between getting cutting edge version in days or weeks or having things unchaged for up to several years. Or in other worlds you will see more bugs in freshly released software, but also bugfixes often within days. Compared to getting new feature only after years, but rarely any bugs (the very few ones that slip through... well, you will get the fix in a few years). That's also where use case plays a bigger role. If you use very new hardware and want software that uses their newest features, a rather stale slow updating distro might not be the right fit for you.
    • Update scheme: Fixed vs. continues release. Continues releases are slowly but constantly changing over time but once installed they can basically used forever. While fixed releases are mostly just shipping critical bugfixes and security patches and doing everything else in big release steps (think in terms of Windows upgrades here: You mostly have the same thing for years but at a certain point there is a newer version that might bring changes in defaults, new pre-installed software, UI changes etc. and after a couple of years you lose support if you don't do that step).

    Also more depending on your personal taste and habits:

    • How much are you willing or interested in tinkering? Basically all distros give you access to all software. But what is pre-installed changes, both in what is provided by default and also how much software is there already. For example do you want stuff for video editing set up already or don't you care as you will test out all the options available anyway?
    • The same is true the basic desktop environment. Gnome and KDE are the two big ones (with some more oftens based or forked from those two). And it mostly a difference of "here is our environment exactly as we think it's best with very little customisation" (Gnome - also the one with most forks, by people who did not agree with the Gnome devs vision) and "have fun customising" (KDE). Is customising stuff to your liking your thing? Or do don't care and also prefer something as close to what you are used to on Windows? Again: Distros have all the options available. But some have one environment or the other pre-installed. Or they come in different flavors from the beginning. If customisation isn't your cup of tea the decision on a certain distro matters much more.

    Other considerations:

    • Immutable distros are more on the newer end of things. They are basically designed more like for example Android. There is a base system that rarely changes and allows basically a "reset ot factory settings", with updates and additionally installed software provided as incremental changes and/or highly containerised. That has benefits (you can revert screw ups easily) but also drawbacks (decades of available linux instructions are now worthless until you really understand where that regular config file you can't edit anymore is now located in some separate container only used by one specific piece of software - and most people that google for such solutions don't). Again this is mostly decided by habits. Are you expecting to tinker with your system or do you just want something that works on its own that neither you or an upgrade cannot possibly break. In the latter case an immutable distro can be the thing for you. And as always... you have all the options and you can also setup most other distros with extensive systems of "save points" to revert problematic changes anyway.

    Things to not consider:

    • ignore the answers speaking about "it provides WINE for running windows stuff" or "it comes with NVIDIA drivers" because they basically all do (minus the already mentioned combination of running cutting edge hardware with very slow updating distros - that's not a good idea). At the worst it usually requires clicking some "Yes, I don't insist on open source stuff exclusively but will also to use proprietary drivers if available" checkbox in the installer.

  • As someone who's been in this for a while, go with Mint.

    It's not a "beginner distro". You can start there, you can stay there as long as you don't develop any super niche prerequisites. Even then, Mint can probably do it.

    The developers are sane and it's a popular system that has been in development for years with many tweaks and improvements. There's a big community around it if you need help/guides.

    You just can't go wrong with it.

    • Long time Mint enjoyer, the ONLY caveat I would put on that is I doesn't yet have stable for support Wayland.

      For a beginner, having the ability to run android apps via waydroid could be a real draw card.

      Wayland support is coming, but it isn't here yet.

    • It's not a "beginner distro".

      I would hardly disagree, that it isnt a beginner Distros. However, this does not mean that Mint is bad. It is a rock solid Distros that is focused on accessibility and being user friendly. It gives everyone who wants the ability to learn Linux/CLI while still giving GUIs as Backup if something is to complex in the command line. However not everyone wants to learn Linux/CLI and this is totally fine. For these People Mint is perfect.

      • That highly depends on what you consider a "beginner distro" to be.

        I don't like the term, because to me, it implies that you have to emigrate from Mint to something else at some point, which is not the case.

        It's not a distro that is supposed to teach you how to do X on Linux systems. It's just a solid OS with a lot of features that are easily accessible, which does make it suited for starters, yes.

        I don't think you have to or should touch the terminal at any time as a regular user and Mint allows you to not do that, as you pointed out as well.

  • It's been asked a million times, and it'll be answered every time, and the answers will mostly be "Mint, Fedora, FedoraKDE, and if you wanna game Bazzite."

    The real advice that gets posted less, regardless of distro:

    • Back up your important files to an external drive, often. It's entirely possible you'll fuck up an install beyond repair (or beyond what you know how to do at the time) and you end up reinstalling. If you can just put your important files back and be up and running, nothing of value is lost.
    • Don't be scared of the terminal, it's incredibly useful. Look up a few YT vids like "bash basics" or "linux terminal for beginners" or something and follow along like it's a class, you'll soon be comfortable enough to use it when you need it, and you will, and you may come to love it. It's not as bad as windows cmd! Be careful when using sudo or su, that's when you could really screw up the system (but mostly it'll be fine just be careful.

    And most importantly, have fun!

    • Here's an absolute classic unix koan about the terminal:

      One evening, Master Foo and Nubi attended a gathering of programmers who had met to learn from each other. One of the programmers asked Nubi to what school he and his master belonged. Upon being told they were followers of the Great Way of Unix, the programmer grew scornful.

      “The command-line tools of Unix are crude and backward,” he scoffed. “Modern, properly designed operating systems do everything through a graphical user interface.”

      Master Foo said nothing, but pointed at the moon. A nearby dog began to bark at the master's hand.

      “I don't understand you!” said the programmer.

      Master Foo remained silent, and pointed at an image of the Buddha. Then he pointed at a window.

      “What are you trying to tell me?” asked the programmer.

      Master Foo pointed at the programmer's head. Then he pointed at a rock.

      “Why can't you make yourself clear?” demanded the programmer.

      Master Foo frowned thoughtfully, tapped the programmer twice on the nose, and dropped him in a nearby trashcan.

      As the programmer was attempting to extricate himself from the garbage, the dog wandered over and piddled on him.

      At that moment, the programmer achieved enlightenment

      Source: https://catb.org/~esr/writings/unix-koans/gui-programmer.html

  • Arch Linux

    Yeah I said it. I never used Mint or Ubuntu, I jumped straight into Arch and then Gentoo and it’s completely possible

    If you stick to beginner friendly distros, you’ll never really learn Linux because they don’t challenge you. Just keep Windows on another drive as a reliable backup OS until you figure things out in Linux

  • Lots of people are going towards ZorinOS, since Windows died with the canning of W10. However, I'd say go for Mint, as that doesn't implement the Snap packaging format (if you need GUI apps, go for Flatpak if you want them sandboxed).

  • Bazzite for a first try. If you never hit a wall needing to make system tweaks, stick to it in the long term. Otherwise, I’m really liking Fedora. KDE/Gnome is personal choice.

  • As someone who's been using Linux for around 12 years now, I just came back to Mint a while ago and it's a good choice for close to everyone I reckon.

    I used pretty much all the major distros and some niche ones as well, but in the end I want a PC that does PC things without having to fuck around all the time. Mint does exactly that, it just works.

    That being said, feel free to mess around with live USBs, try some distros on an old laptop etc, it's good fun and you might find something you really like.

  • Everyone has their own preferences, many of the loudest pretend Linux is sport betting, it's not.

    What you care about is:

    • how well does it support your hardware
    • how well does it support your use case
    • how open is the community around the distro to new users

    The core OS's have pretty good support and open minded communities.

    Debian, Fedora, Ubuntu, Mint

    Then you have distros that try to cater more to specific needs, like Bazzite focuses on steam and video drivers staying 100% ready out of the box. That's not to say that current Debian, Fedora, Ubuntu and Mint can't install and just work, but it's not their primary focus.

    Debian was old and rigid about non-free software Ubuntu forked and allowed free, and their community blossomed. Ubuntu made marketing decisions with Amazon and some other stuff that wierded people out Mint formed the community started heading over there. Ubuntu tried to start doing snap package manager which people hated, so Mint got stronger. Debian finally said ohh fine you can have non-free software, no mint and Debian are both strong and well liked with pretty good support and communities. Fedora is from the old Redhat lineage and is a strong contender with an ancient community and lots of support. Mint, Debian, Fedora and Ubuntu still all have strong communities and lots of support. They're a great place to start. Bazzite is a Fedora port that focuses on Gaming and Video driver support.
    There is some stink in the air about Fedora dropping 32 bit support, if that happens Both Fedora and Bazzite will have a very hard time supporting games. As long as Fedora keeps 32 bit support, Bazzite is the best for getting your games running out of the box.

    Video editing can be challenging. Divinci Resolve is pretty good, but the free version has harsh limits. KDEnlive is free and ok, but it really lacks authoring features.

    Watching streams is easy

    Streaming live video is messier. OBS still works a treat, but you don't have Nvidia background removal, and most of the other removal options in Linux are anemic.

  • Honestly, whatever you go with, you should make sure it has KDE plasma, it has a graphical interface that more closely resembles Windows and can function as training wheels until you better familiarize yourseld with the terminal. If you're looking at Ubuntu, just be aware that you will likely find it irritating once you start understanding how the system works as it forces its own package manager, snap, which introduces a slew of difficulties in acclamaiting to the Linux ecosystem. However, snap does make installation easier for newcomers who may not understand how to identify dependencies for a given package they wish to install. With all of this in mind, Kubuntu is a really good option for first-timers as its a flavour of Ubuntu that comes with KDE Plasma out of the box.

  • Mint is best but if that don't work try Fedora KDE.

    I also recommend watching The Linux Experiment's videos

  • If you're not looking to do much you might be better off with one of the immutable variants (silver blue, aurora, bazzite). The upside is things are not supposed to break too much. The downside is if it breaks almost any existing instructions on the internet prior to maybe 2022 will fuck the system up more. Tbh Linux changes so fast that's true for most variants, but you can reach back to maybe 2018 before you start to hit system-breaking legacy instructions.

    Mint isn't a good choice, but if you want a generally straightforward system that looks like Mac (gnome) or windows (KDE) then fedora is a good choice.

    None of these options will be as secure by default as a Mac or windows machine -- you will have to do a lot of learning and be generally technically inclined to get there. The immutable OSs will give you a small leg up there, just because you're running less random shit from the internet as admin/root, but the Linux community hates Intel and Microsoft so much it's taken a lonnnngggg time to adopt standard security techniques, mostly resting on their laurels from decades past. Will you get viruses? Probably not. But just because nobody broke in doesn't mean leaving your door unlocked is secure.

167 comments