So, you’re new to Linux? Welcome to our community!
You probably ask yourself
“Where should I start?”
and feel a bit overwhelmed right now.
In this guide, I will show you how to choose your first Linux distro.
This is part of my “New to Linux?”-series, where I will guide you through your first weeks.
TL;DR: If you don’t care about this at all, just go for Linux Mint.
As you’ve probably already heard, “Linux” isn’t just an operating system by itself, it’s just the engine of it.
You need stuff built around that to get a working desktop. That “stuff” is packaged and distributed, hence the name “distro” (distribution).
Everyone can package this stuff themselfes and make their own operating system.
There are literally hundreds or thousands of different Linux-based OSs out there, and as a newcomer, this choice can be very overwhelming.
This is why you’ve already came here and asked for advice.
Don’t worry, we’ve all been there!
You can find the “right” one for you if you follow the flow chart.
The flow chart is complementary to the text here. The diagram is for the choice, while the text is more for general information about each distro.
Every distro of the following recommended ones meets all of these criteria:
- Easy to understand and intuitive to use
- You don’t have to use the command line
- Works reliable
- Supports Nvidia-GPUs
Choosing the DE
Before you choose your distro, you should choose your prefered desktop environment (DE).
The DE is what defines the user interface and some core apps, so, basically, what you interact with.
Don’t mainly choose the distro because of its’ DE, you can change that later too if you really want.
The two main DEs (Gnome and KDE) are listed in the flow chart.
KDE
- is very modular and configurable, you can turn it into whatever you want.
- has pretty much everything you can imagine already built in
Gnome
- Is more opinionated, but if you don’t like its’ unique workflow, you can turn it into a “classic” desktop with minimize/ maximize buttons, task bar, and more, too.
- You can use the
Extension manager/Gnome Tweaksfor doing that or getting other functionalities like smartphone integration for example.
If you like certain aspects of one, but others from the “competitor”, you can more or less turn one into the other. You have maximum freedom!
#Differences between distros
**Choose your distro based on the following key points: **
- Release schedule: Some get new features very often, some only once a few years. We refer this as stagnation as “stability” (not to conflict with reliability!)
- Philosophy: What are key values of the distro? (e.g. just providing a well functioning set of software, no matter if it’s proprietary; conservative vs. innovative; etc.)
- Base: Many distros are based on other ones. A very common base is Debian or Ubuntu, where many newcomer-guides are based on. It mainly determines what package manager you use in the command line. I personally think that’s not as important, since you will use the Software Center anyway most of the time to download apps and updates.
- All other things, like big community, good track record, hardware support, etc., were already taken care of by me.
So, here’s the list of every distro shown in the flow chart, with a short description on why it is included.
Linux Mint
It’s THE recommendation for every newcomer, no matter where you look. Not without reason:
- Very sane defaults
- Works, just out-of-the-box
- Not too many, but just the right amount of pre-installed apps to get in touch with the Linux app ecosystem
- Simple, yet highly functional
- Hides all “advanced” features in a reasonable way
- Huge userbase, especially for beginners. More experienced users still use Mint, and are always there to help newcomers.
- Doesn’t change much, only gets more polished. New features arrive occasionally, but they usually don’t change your workflow radically.
- Feels very familiar when you came from Windows, which most people do.
Website: https://www.linuxmint.com/
ZorinOS
It is the main “competitor” of Mint right now.
The big difference between Mint and it is how the desktop looks. While Mint is more old-fashioned in how it looks, Zorin wants to be an eye pleaser by looking more modern. With it, you can choose between different “styles”, that mimic the looks of Windows 7, Windows 11, MacOS, and more, depending on what you feel the most comfortable with.
It has a slow release schedule of ~3 years, with some minor polishes in between, which is great if you don’t like change.
Don’t worry about the “Pro” and “Light” versions. This is not like a freeware app with ads and stuff.
- “Pro” refers to the paid version, that only differs in some extra styles you can choose from. With the payment you get some extra tech assistance and support the developers.
- “Light” is a lightweight version, that is made for old devices to give them a second life and make them perform better than before, while still looking good.
Website: https://zorin.com/os/
VanillaOS
This one is also very promising. It has the same philosophy as Mint, but implements it differently.
It works a bit different under the hood and ensures an always working system you can’t brick. If you still fucked up something, or got a bad update somehow, you can just roll back in seconds.
It also updates itself in the background and applies the updates without the user noticing on the next reboot, without any waiting time (unlike the forced Windows updates).
If you become more advanced and experienced over time, you can turn to the terminal and have access to literally any app that was ever made for Linux. Especially if you start using Linux as developer, this is very handy.
Even if you aren’t a developer, no, even if you aren’t techy at all, VanillaOS is a very good choice if you prefer the simplicity and ease of use of Mint, but want something more modern!
Website: https://vanillaos.org/
[Disclaimer: The new release, VanillaOS 2 Orchid, is currently under very high developement and still in beta. Consider waiting until the new version is officially released for a garanteed smooth experience.]
Fedora
This one is not exactly (but comparably) as beginner oriented as the above are, but still, a very good choice for new users. Fedora is often considered “the new Ubuntu”, and is one of the most used distros out there with a gigantic community.
It is community-owned, but supported by the money and development power of the biggest player in the commercial Linux world.
Features:
- Comes with any major DE you want + huge software availability
- Balanced desktop release schedule of 6 months. This ensures both a modern and reliable desktop system
- Everything is pretty vanilla (no theming, etc.) and has very sane defaults
- No big collection of pre-installed software (e.g. Office), bit it is installable with one click in the software center.
- Future-oriented: as soon as a new promising technology is reliable enough, it will adopt it.
Website:
https://fedoraproject.org/
https://fedoraproject.org/workstation/
https://fedoraproject.org/spins/kde/
Fedora Atomic
Fedora Atomic is a variant of Fedora that works different under the hood, while behaving the same on the surface as the regular Fedora does. I don’t want to get too technical here, but the pros are the same as the ones from VanillaOS (unbrickable, better security, no half applied updates, etc.).
I’m not sure if I would recommend it over the normal Fedora right now, as due to the other inner workings, you might have the chance to encounter issues when trying to get things working, e.g. an install script you found online.
If you are leaning bit more towards a tech-savy-person and have no problem searching a small thing here and there (only when you need non-ordinary stuff), then definitely check it out. Especially if you already came from another distro and feel dissatisfied.
BUT, keep following in mind:
- If you are just a casual user, you don’t need the terminal for this distro. If you want to really make full use of it tho, you might have to use it from time to time.
- On the surface, it looks and behaves exactly like the normal Fedora.
- Compatibility is not fully given, due to the double edged nature of the said new technology.
- Those potential issues or cons sound more dramatic than they are. If you are a normal user, you won’t encounter these. Even I never had any compatibility-issues and always got everything working.
One of the coolest things about it, apart from the pros mentioned above, are:
- Most “hidden” parts of the OS are irrelevant now to you if you want to change something -> simpler structure
- You can “swap out” the OS with something different any time you want, while also keeping your data (pictures, games, etc.). If you want to switch your DE for example later on, you can do that very easily by just changing the selected spin. This even works in the extend of rebasing to almost another distro!
uBlue
If you are interested now, then check out UniversalBlue instead of the “official” Silverblue or Kinoite. uBlue offers:
- Many different variants of this distro, but with some quality-of-life changes included.
- Custom builds for special hardware, e.g. Microsoft Surface devices, ASUS ROG, etc., which come working OOTB, are very reliable and don’t require tinkering.
- And also special variants for different tastes and use cases, e.g. a security-enhanced variant, as well as
Bazzite
which is one of the biggest and “best” example in how awesome uBlue can be. It’s derived from it and is a gaming-focused distro. With it, you get many optimization tweaks and tools for gaming included out of the box, like some performance enhancements for example.
You don’t need a gaming distro to play games at all, but if that’s what you mostly do with your PC, then maybe consider that.
Links:
https://fedoraproject.org/atomic-desktops/silverblue/
https://universal-blue.org/installation/
https://bazzite.gg
Arch and NixOS
Those two are in the “pain” category. I would never recommend them to anyone starting with Linux, for example because they’re fed up with Windows.
Both Arch and NixOS are known to be “for experts only”, meaning, they’re
- high demanding
- hard to set up and use
- requiring the user to be skilled and to know what he’s doing
- don’t hold the users’ hand
- and don’t tolerate user error well.
Why did I still decide to include them in my noob-recommended list anyway? Well, because not everyone wants to start Linux expecting an easy road. There are some people who want to tinker and challenge themselfes, and some birds learn flying the best when kicked out of the nest.
Don’t get me wrong! Both Arch and NixOS are fantastic choices and very powerful. They can be fun to use and very rewarding.
What makes them great?
- Minimalism: they come with basically nothing out of the box and require the user to set up everything themselfes. If you’ve done that, you have an OS that’s truly yours!
- Skilled community and great wiki. Especially the Arch-wiki is the number-one-ressource for any Linux thing, and by the point you installed Arch or NixOS the hard way, you got a good understanding in the inner workings of Linux.
- Rolling release: as soon as packages are released, you get them, no big release versions
- Biggest package repositories ever, with many inofficial ones too, created by the user base
- Great package manager
Alternatives
If those pro-points of Arch and NixOS are appealing to you, but sound too hard to get for your taste, here are some alternatives you may consider instead. They aren’t my top pick, but still very popular in the community.
- Debian: One of the oldest distros ever out there. It’s what a lot of other distros, including Mint, Ubuntu, Zorin, and more, are based on. It’s stable (the normal version at least), very flexible (supports many CPU architectures) and minimalist (if you want).
- OpenSuse Tumbleweed/ Slowroll: Rolling release like Arch, but with a bigger safety net behind
- EndeavourOS: Very sane Arch-distro that’s already set up for you
Other honorable mentions
Pop!_OS
Also gets recommended often. A popular distro for everyone who likes the coherence of Gnome, but doesn’t like the opinionated workflow and more features like tiling. Good Ubuntu alternative, especially for gaming.
- Made by a hardware manufacturer.
- Based on Ubuntu/ Debian.
- Currently a bit outdated. The devs are focusing on their self-developed new DE that’s coming soon. I would go for Fedora (general use) or Bazzite (gaming) and add the tweaks myself via extensions when needed.
Still a viable option.
MX Linux
- Great for older devices with non-optimal performance.
TuxedoOS
- Best Debian/ Ubuntu-based distro with KDE.
- Also made by a hardware manufacturer.
Thank you for the advice. Im going to try Linux Mint, but im interested in privacy. Is it true they dont collect data?
Yes, this is basically true.
Some desktops offer an opt-in telemetry, but as it implies, it is almost always disabled by default and up to you if you want to support the devs in giving them anonymized (and usually reviewed by you!) data about crashes and some patterns.But, in contrast to Microsoft and others, this is no “spying”, and you can always check for yourself what they maybe want to collect. Open source devs are usually extremely transparent about what they might consider from you.
The reason for that is that most devs just expect you reporting bugs yourself if any arise, so they didn’t even make the effort to implement telemetry :D
Thank you. Im om a jouney into Linux world. I will look forward to 🙂
Very nice. I’d suggest adding ChimeraOS next to Bazzite.
Also I’m not sure I’d recommend Vanilla to a beginner yet. It’s a very cool OS, but it’s got a lot of new tech that most instructions online won’t work on, and would frustrate a beginner.
Both valid points. Thanks!
What would you say Chimera does better than Bazzite? In my eyes, Bazzite is superior, because of how the immutability is handled. Chimera is more edge case in my eyes (1:1 clone of SteamOS, IIRC), while Bazzite is just gaming focused, but can still do everything else too.
For Vanilla, I’m not sure. Maybe I will keep it included, but put the disclaimer in there about the incompatibility of many instructions. For simple tasks, it should work perfectly.
I wouldn’t know what it does better, because I’ve never used Bazzite. Chimera is nice though, and it’s another option to inform someone of.
I’ve just looked up in their documentation, and they’re Arch based and atomic.
One thing I’m always a bit cautious of is the community support. On Bazzite, you have an already big community, and almost everything is applicable from Fedora Silverblue. It also builds itself without anyone needing to patch stuff, thanks to uBlues’ GitHub build actions.
I personally see Bazzite as a better option for “normal” PCs, that are multi-purpose and not only there as gaming console.
It also offers a variant that boots directly into BPM if you want that.Also, I think Fedora Atomic is better due to rpm-ostree instead of A/B-root, which is quite inflexible and doesn’t support layering.
That’s great, man. If you recommend Bazzite over Chimera, good on you. I’m telling you that I use Chimera and I like it. It’s simple enough that my wife can use it on the PC I built her. If you want to add it to your flowchart, go ahead. If not, whatever, it’s your chart.
Thank you for your input!
Everyone should choose their first distro based on what his friend/neighbor uses already. Direct support can’t be beaten.
So nixos or gentoo then.
please not gentoo. I don’t thin any bird leaarns best how to fly by having their nest nuked
Great advice! That’s why I will also install Fedora Silverblue or VanillaOS on my mums’ laptop in the future. Currently, I put Mint on hers, because she is older and I thought she might prefer having something that reminds her of “the good ol’ days”. But I find myself needing to google stuff she could have searched for herself, because I also don’t know how to fix it.
Sure, I could resort to the terminal, but I want her to see how I do things to let her fix them herself in the future if the need arises.
TL;DR: If you just care about having something that works reliably then install Debian + GNOME + Software as Flatpaks. You’ll get a rock solid system with the latest software.
About the desktop environment: the “what you go for it’s entirely your choice” mantra when it comes to DE is total BS. What happens is that you’ll find out while you can use any DE in fact GNOME will provide a better experience because most applications on Linux are design / depend on its components. Using KDE or XFCE is fun until you run into some GTK/libadwaita application and small issues start to pop here and there, windows that don’t pick on your theme or you just created a Frankenstein of a system composed of KDE + a bunch of GTK components.
Good advice!
I personally think tho, that Debian isn’t the best beginner distro.
Not, because it’s not user friendly or something, but more because of the complicated and unintuitive installer.Take Mint or Zorin for example, where you basically only need to click “next next” and it’s installed, and after that, you get a wonderful first start wizard where everything gets explained (how to download new apps, get updates, etc.).
I had a lot of issues when installing Debian after some days, because of a non-optimal suggested partitioning layout, misconfigured mirror-server list or network for example.
But once it’s running, it’s very solid!As I mentioned in the post, Debian (+ Flatpaks) is a great choice, but I’d recommend something else tbh.
Still, thank you for your addition!
GNOME should at least support colour schemes, in my opinion. If they don’t want theming, they can at least do that. In any case, Gradience can help with getting a coherent colour scheme on non-GNOME/libadwaita environments, and if the user is just using Breeze, they already have a Breeze colour scheme available. It’s available as a Flatpak.
I had a lot of issues when installing Debian after some days, because of a non-optimal suggested partitioning layout, misconfigured mirror-server list or network for example.
For what’s worth I never had those kinds of issues with the Debian installer, to me it seems that anyone capable of installing Windows 10/11 is capable of installing Debian on the bases of “next > next > next” everything as defaults and will get to a working desktop.
I’ve seen a few people complaining about the Debian installer but I never had issues at all. From servers to laptops always seems to get things right for me.
Honest question, what is unintuitive about the Debian installer? I’m asking because I’ve done it so many times that it’s intuitive for me.
@TCB13@lemmy.world @pmk@lemmy.sdf.org Maybe the installer isn’t bad, and I’m probably just dumb. You aren’t the only ones saying this, so maybe not Debian, but me is the problem.
Well there’s something about it that is confusing compared to other installers? For example there is a text message instructing the users what happens if they don’t set a root password. Many people miss it, but it’s right there. If many people miss it, there’s something that can be improved.
Maybe something (very) hardware specific?
Not unintuitive, but thinking about it from a beginner standpoint, calamares-based systems are way easier to ‘get’. These distros don’t ask for domain names, proxies, usage surveys etc. This stuff isn’t that complicated, but they add an extra level of things you need to worry about if you’ve never used Linux before, which is the kind of person who this flow chart is made for.
great list !! meowz theres nothing i can think of that u missed so well done :3
Thank you a lot! 😊 It was days of work!
Btw, it’s always awesome to see the colorful variety on Lemmy! 🦈🌈
Hi, Thank you for this post! Maybe it’s just me but your flowchart link is broken.
How to choose your 1st distro:
-Have 1 monitor: Linux Mint
-Have more than 1 monitor: Fedora
-Have a potato PC: AntiX
I like pain
I am in this picture and I don’t like it…
I’m only referring to Arch now because I have no idea about NixOS.
Arch and NixOS Those two are in the “pain” category. I would never recommend them to anyone starting with Linux, for example because they’re fed up with Windows
In my opinion, you are making the mistake of equating all Windows users. But not every Windows user is the same.
An acquaintance of mine, who works full-time as a Windows administrator, was able to install and configure Arch manually on his first attempt, for example. But yes, other Windows users would despair.
But that’s exactly why you shouldn’t make blanket recommendations, but rather recommendations based on the wishes and knowledge of the person who wants to use Linux.
high demanding
Basically, you should be able to read and willing use a search engine. That’s all you really need.
hard to set up and use
If you use archinstall, which has long been an official part of the Arch iso file, you can install Arch within a short time. But I don’t think manual installation is very difficult either. Because if you follow the official instructions, you can simply execute many of the commands mentioned therein without having to change them beforehand.
And what do you mean by hard to use?
I’ve been using Arch for over 10 years, almost like any other distribution. Apart from only 3 things, 2 of which can be automated.
- Before an update, I check whether something has been published at https://archlinux.org/news/ that affects my installations. If so, that has to be taken into account. The check itself can be automated with https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/informant, for example.
- The cache of pacman must be cleaned regularly. This can also be automated with a hook (https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Pacman#Cleaning_the_package_cache).
- From time to time, I synchronise my configuration files with the pacnew files. There are tools for this (https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/pacman/Pacnew_and_Pacsave#Managing_.pac*_files)
requiring the user to be skilled and to know what he’s doing
Not necessarily. The most important thing is that the user is willing to read, that he is willing to use a search engine and that he is willing to learn something new. And that is often the problem these days.
And shall I tell you something? Even after several decades with Linux, I often have no idea what I’m doing. But I’m still trying to acquire new knowledge.
don’t hold the users’ hand
I agree with you here. Arch is, among other things, intended for users who want to solve their problems themselves. But that doesn’t mean that you can’t get help. However, it is expected that you first try to solve your problems yourself. And if that doesn’t work, you should ask smart questions. However, this guide does not only help with Arch. Basically, it is (even if it is now partly outdated) still one of the most important pieces of knowledge you can have.
and don’t tolerate user error well.
I have been using Linux for over 20 years and have therefore already used several distributions. Basically none of them tolerate errors. If I make a mistake when configuring Alacritty under Ubuntu, for example, basically the same thing happens as under Arch.
Edit: Please don’t take this post the wrong way. My point is not to claim that Arch is like Ubuntu, for example. But these myths that have formed around Arch (e.g. that you can only learn Linux properly with Arch (which is complete nonsense)) are a bit annoying.
Of course, you’re right. I know I made some blanket statements, but I found it necessary to simplify everything a bit.
I personally have the feeling you contradict yourself tho. You basically say “Arch is super easy”, but then list 100 reasons why it isn’t.
As I said in the post, Arch is a fantastic distro, but nothing I would recommend for anyone.
Most people don’t use their OS as a nerd hobby (sorry!), but as a means to get their software they need (browser, office, games, etc.) running.They just want something that works reliably and doesn’t get in their way.
They don’t care if they use zfs or btrfs as filesystem or run the newest KDE framework.Needing to check the news page on daily basis, or risking to brick their system otherwise, is a big no-go for most.
Of course, installing it isn’t the hardest part.
But maintaining it reasonably is also important, which happens mostly passively on other systems. Turning on the PC and getting greeted by GRUB emergency mode is the worst case for anyone, and would result in installing Windows again for most.
Also, it’s very minimalist. For users who already know what they need, that’s good.
I don’t know if you know the greentext-meme with the Arch-guy who had to share his screen, but couldn’t because of his missing component, and then got laughed at and overshadowed by the girl with her Windows laptop.This “bloat” is what makes a comfortable computing experience for most other people, and needing to google “Arch no sound” and fixing something for two hours is just something not everyone is comfortable and willing with.
That’s why I’ve made the big disclaimer and said it should only be chosen if you’re ready for a big learning experience and have the patience for that.
I keep coming back to Mint+cinnamon as my daily driver and debian+xfce on older hardware. They just work and both distros and DE are simple and familiar coming from win10. There are enough built-in customization options for me to get the desktop looking how I want it but I don’t have to spend a day configuring it if I don’t want to. It might be a basic choice for basic people, but I was up and running in about an hour and after a month of not booting into windows I wiped that old drive to make room for data. I may switch over to LMDE at some point, but that is more philosophically motivated than an actual need.
There’s something to be said for simplicity.
I wouldn’t recommend Fedora for NVidia users because it wants to be Wayland-only. The introduction is quite good though
Year of the Linux desktop might just happen if you keep making flowcharts like this.
It must really suck for Windows or Mac users whose flowcharts only have one flowchart box between them and actually using their computer ;P
Do you like pain and wasting as much time as possible? Gentoo. Jk jk I’ve never used it, I’ve only seen memes about it.
gentoo takes a long time. but currently they started shipping out binaries – and with a more recent architecture too (x86-64-p2 or - p4) which helps a lot as compared to building your own Libre office.
they got good guides as well. I got to use one for troubleshooting even if I use a diff distro.
Installing Gentoo requires you to 1. follow a long list of instructions (correctly, in order, without skipping) and 2. be willing to make some decisions about your system setup. I don’t consider that painful, but some people apparently do. It’s also useful to bring a book or some other secondary form of entertainment to occupy yourself with during the non-interactive parts of the install process. Once the initial install is done, you can minimize wasted time by starting updates right before leaving the computer, or just configure it to always leave one core free for your interactive needs.
Gentoo has never been an appropriate distribution for new Linux users with no technical background, or people who want their system to “just work” without caring about how. It’s always been about choice, and its flexibility is both a strength and a weakness. Regardless, the OP did the correct thing by not including it in their guide.
Laughing in Linux From Scratch.
You didn’t even write your own kernel, sad!
Gentoo isn’t so much painful but it takes a bloody long time. If anything, some of the packages are really painful. Qtwebengine is one such example.
I feel like EndeavourOS should just be a side option from Arch with the statement “I want to install the OS with a GUI”
What about window managers? i3wm as example
This isn’t a complete full guide on ALL distros and DEs/ TWMs, just a small selection for newcomers.
Too much choice is overwhelming, and giving them basically a choice between A or B, where both options are great, was the best idea I came up with.
Regarding window managers:
- I think that they are too different from the stuff most people are comfortable with.
- They usually don’t come with all stuff one might need, e.g. a settings menu, task bar, etc.
- Too complicated to set up, requires a terminal and knowledge about how the WM works
- Not necessary. Useful if you mostly do text based stuff, especially coding or terminal, but for GUI apps, not so much
- And, last but not least, too big selection with all looking the same. If I mention i3, then another would say “Sway is better”, and then I add Sway, and another one wants BSPWM, Hyprland, Herbstluft, and so on and so on. It’s just a can of worms I don’t want to open. If you ever come into contact with WMs, you probably are experienced enough and already have a good grasp.
Still, thank yo for your comment!
