I’ve been distrohopping for a while now, and eventually I landed on Arch. Part of the reason I have stuck with it is I think I had a balanced introduction, since I was exposed to both praise and criticism. We often discuss our favorite distros, but I think it’s equally important to talk about the ones that didn’t quite hit the mark for us because it can be very helpful.
So, I’d like to ask: What is your least favorite Linux distribution and why? Please remember, this is not about bashing or belittling any specific distribution. The aim is to have a constructive discussion where we can learn about each other’s experiences.
My personal least favorite is probably Manjaro.
Consider:
- What specific features/lack thereof made it less appealing?
- Did you face any specific challenges?
- How was your experience with the community?
- If given a chance, what improvements would you suggest?
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Ubuntu / snaps
I’m about to piss off a lot of people.
It’s Arch and Arch-derivatives. And I’m saying it as an Arch user, btw, and I actually love it.
Between the Big Three (Fedora, Debian, Arch), it is the least likely to have an official package for somewhat niche applications. If something is not available as a flatpak or appimage, I have to compile it from source or an AUR PKGBUILD, but we all know the dangers of doing that. Some software will just assume that it’s running on a particular disribution, usually Ubuntu. Some software will detect the distribution and straight-up refuse to work on Arch.
That being said, it would take a lot to make me switch to a stable point-release distribution. Arch’s advantages more than make up for the sub-par software support.
(actually, I lied. Fuck Canonical and *Ubuntu. And IBM.)
Some software will just assume that it’s running on a particular disribution, usually Ubuntu. Some software will detect the distribution and straight-up refuse to work on Arch.
Name to blame, please.
Twingate Connector. The installer script only works if the OS uses either the APT or the DNF package manager, otherwise it exits. Fortunately it has many deployment methods, including Docker. I ended up using the systemd unit in a Debian container inside Proxmox.
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Just use Distrobox my friend.
I use it on Fedora Atomic (Silverblue) and I install Arch- and AUR-software all the time.
In that way I can access everything I want and still enjoy the comfort of my unbreakable base.
Another plus is that if I should break my Arch container, I can just remove and reinstall it without affecting my host. The performance is about the same as with Flatpaks, so, negabile.If you like Arch, then just use Ubuntu/ Debian/ Fedora/ whatever as container image and never stress yourself anymore with PKGBUILD
This is a balanced take in my opinion. Also an Arch user. Distrobox has helped remedy things somewhat.
Ubuntu because they’ve the ability to great things and end up just delivering a buggy and mangled version of Debian with proprietary crap, spyware, snaps wtv. After all we’re talking about the distro that had ISOs on their download page with a broken installer multiple times.
I don’t hate them, but this hits hard. They are THE most influential distro for people outside of the community. They have by far the biggest user base and community, but instead of using this to collaborate with other distributions and specially with the freedesktop folks for the improvement of the commons, they have this culture of downstream work that rarely get the effort needed to be upstreamed. It’s usually “it’s good enough for us, so that’s where we’ll leave it”, and they end up with these weird solutions that only they use.
It’s usually “it’s good enough for us, so that’s where we’ll leave it”, and they end up with these weird solutions that only they use.
Exactly. And to make things even worse then you’ve people upstream (Debian) or sidestream (other distros) that eventually decide to implement whatever they did but properly and then they go there, pick it and replace their original implementation.
My least favourites are probably ubuntu and manjaro, not so much because of the distros themselves but the organizations behind them being a bit dodge.
I know it’s probably an odd choice, but ChromeOS. It has the potential to be not just a good starting point for new Linux users but also a distro that could allow Linux to be a lot more accessible to people who aren’t as technologically capable. The main problem is that, similar to android, Google prevents ChromeOS from being used as a proper Linux distro. Right now, it might be a good alternative to Windows and MacOS but as a Linux distro, it’s just not worth using. Especially considering that Linux already has some options available for running android apps, such as Waydroid, that work pretty well.
I really think Google has no idea what it wants ChromeOS to be anymore, they’re just kinda shoving in shoddy solutions to its problems so they can say “hey we can do that too!”
soon they’re gonna introduce Steam and I look forward to that being a big shitshow lol
Have they ever? ChromeOS’s original “app store” was just Chrome’s extension store. It’s been awhile since I’ve checked but Google doesn’t (or at least didn’t) officially support running android apps in ChromeOS Flex. Instead of focusing on getting more apps running on ChromeOS, they’re actively working on Google Play Games for Windows (which also hurts android). For which I think I saw that there are games that work in Google Play Games but they don’t work in ChromeOS for some reason. I’d imagine that there are a lot of other weird things but it’s been a while since I’ve actually used it.
It’s just one of those things where, ChromeOS has the potential to be a good competitor to Windows and MacOS (and maybe even a good Linux distro) but for some reason Google does nothing with it to make it worth using and actually seems to be actively harming it.
It’s Pichai’s handiwork from what I understand. He was in charge of it before becoming CEO according to Wikipedia.
Ubuntu: For shilling all kinds of profrietary garbage by default. If I wanted that I’d be on Windows.
Also the changes they make to GNOME make it worse, they take away what makes it good, the flow.
Exactly what I came here to say.
Prompt me for Ubuntu Pro once (in the GUI on first login)? Shame on you, but I’ll move past it.
Put an ad in the terminal every time I update my system though? Straight to jail.
NIXOS. It has a very steep learning curve without acceptable documentation and once I climbed the learning curve, I realized that it was very different from the Linux that I love.
I hope you dont give up on it for too long, I think it’s a great OS once you get the hang of nix. To this day, its the only OS I trust where I could install anything I want and can still rollback without worries. Also I can make sure that my installation is the same as others, which means other people can literally just copy paste my config to test.
For me personally: Something like Arch. I want to spend as little time as possible on installation and configuration, and I don’t want to have to read update notes or break my system. But I get that it’s great for some people, and their wiki is just next level!
In general: Ubuntu. It feels like I read something about Canonical causing trouble every other week, and don’t even get me started on snaps!
Just to share my experience, I used the archinstall script so I have btrfs snapshots and didnt have to put together everything myself. I almost update every day because it gives me a dopamine hit and nothing has broken in the last year and a half since I switched off Windows. I’ve had fewer issues than when I tried to Fedora with the Nvidia card I already owned. It could definitely be a case of ‘works on my machine’ but I think reports of Arch breakages are overblown.
I had to hold off on updating my Debian 12 server due to a severe bug just a month or two ago.
Completely agree on both points. Canonical always acts against the spirit of open-source whenever they get the chance.
And while Arch is great, I prefer things that work out of the box.
Ubuntu: It’s not a lack of features that pushed me away; it’s more about the way things are going. I am not a fan of snap packages. I have run into odd issues trying to use them. I used Ubuntu server for my Dell Poweredge and I shut it down until I can find a suitable replacement. I struggled with it respecting my DNS settings which in turn killed my reverse proxy setup.
Manjaro: While I love Arch and some of its derivatives, I can’t stand by Manjaro. I thought it would have been a good OS to use since I was familiar with Arch, but it had enough dependency issues where updates broke them. Funny enough, never have I had a dependency issue with just plain old Arch.
I use Arch btw. But besides the meme on it, I legitimately eo use arch and couldn’t be happier.
Same. Both started out good but kept becoming more and more… not good. If nothing else Manjaro taught me how to chroot from a live distro to fix catastrophic failures. Ubuntu really ruined my week when they decided to try becoming a smart phone with the very touch centric looking UI at the time when I didn’t have time to revert or change distros, which is what finally pushed me to run servers headless and use ssh. Last I tried none of the phone like de’s are particularly intuitive as touch interfaces either.
I use KDE on Arch on my Lenovo Yoga 7i, and I don’t particularly use the touchscreen as much as I would have thought. Though for Waydroid it does work fairly nicely.
I’m going to mention two:
Manjaro. I’ve attempted to use Manjaro a few different times, and outside of a VM it just didn’t work properly; on my laptop it would boot loop for reasons I don’t understand, it had poor hardware support and optimization on a Raspberry Pi, and it didn’t last long on my desktop. It’s had its chances, I’m done trying.
I really did not hitch horses with Pop!_OS, and it’s almost entirely because Pop!_OS started at Gnome and kept fucking going. Just thinking about the two miserable weeks I spent trying to get Gnome to do anything is making me physically angry. Words like disobedient and belligerent come to mind when I think of what it’s like to use Pop!_OS. Linux Mint is designed to feel familiar to anyone coming from Windows. Pop!_OS feels like it’s designed to be the opposite of that, it deliberately doesn’t work the way you think it does. YOU have to conform to IT. And I FUCKING hate it. It is never welcome on my hardware ever again.
yep. i dont see a reason to use Manjaro when EndevourOs is basically the same, but better (and a nicer color theme!)
Why does endeavor OS describe itself as a terminal-centric OS?
That alone turns me off from using it. I try to avoid the terminal at all costs.
im pretty sure you can get by pretty well without the terminal, for the most part. although, it is arch based, and its kind of the point. no distro is for everyone.
its besides the point, but why dont u like the terminal?
its besides the point, but why dont u like the terminal?
Because it’s way harder to remember and use text commands than it is to navigate a GUI.
I also don’t like taking my hand off the mouse if I can avoid it.
fair enough.
Someone already said Manjaro, so my second pick would be ElementaryOS. In the past they’ve had this weird attitude about open source things being free (I get supporting devs for projects you like of course, but I don’t agree that it’s “cheating” to not pay for every single piece of open source software you use), and they seem to get a lot of hype and praise for what’s essentially just Ubuntu painted up to look like MacOS IMO.
I always confuse it with Sugar
Unpopular opinion :
- Arch, i installed it long ago so i can’t remember anything except that i spent lot hours for its installation.
- Reason : spend a lot time reading the wiki without an easy installer…even Ubuntu was better but i wanted a challenge and a better uderstanding on linux.
- Some AUR package didn’t work.
- Why Arch ? To get the lastest os and package as i had a recent gaming laptop.
So I changed and prefered manjaro with its ui for linux os, graphic card…but some thing were broken…than i settled Pop-Os for 3 years and distrohopped again for immutable os : Vanilla OS and Fedora Kinoite. :)
Another distro :
- Ubuntu
- reason : snap and various decisions.
I enjoyed arch for how straight forward the install was.
Gentoo however, every time I do that from scratch it’s with X, Westland is NetworkManager that give up (my recommendation is oddlamma installer)
Yeah Arch is straight forward but is require an amazing amount of focus and concentration. :)
I should try gentoo as my next challenge, i guess i won’t like it but in fact, i enjoy those challenge and trying new stuff. ^^
You need to learn how bullets work, my friend.
Bullets in markdown ?
* like this ? * or like that ?As in what does it mean to itemize. In this case to make an unordered list.
Sorry, my english comprehension is rusty. It is an unordered list. I used it to improve readibility on phone and separate topics.
If the topic is mixed in a paragraphe i would have a harder time to quickly retrieve informations. Here you can read Arch and ubuntu and why in a single glance.
Not a whole lot of experience distro-hopping here (went from Ubuntu to Endeavour and haven’t really changed since) but from what I know it seems like most distros have their place. Arch is highly customisable and all rolling release distros are good for gamers and those who need the latest software. Debian, Ubuntu, Mint, and other LTS distros are good for servers and newcomers (fewer big updates and therefore fewer potential crises)
For the sake of answering the question, I’d say Ubuntu is my least favourite. Its pretty bloated, and then there’s the whole snap fiasco
TL;DR: Ubuntu. Because I want choices.
Ubuntu. And I’ve felt that way for a long time, so it’s not something recentish like snaps.
I don’t want my distro to decide what DE and software I’m using for me. They used to have a minimal iso which gave you, as the name suggests, a very minimal install. But now their minimal image is meant for containerized stuff and if memory serves comes with some extra cruft for that purpose.
I got annoyed and I left. And every distro I’ve tried since, even if I didn’t stick with it, I liked better.
To add some constructiveness, as that’s just complaining. That can be a good thing, just depends on the user. If they want the crafted experience Ubuntu provides, then it’s a good pick. It’s just not for me.
I use Fedora as my primary desktop distro. It’s a sturdy base with relatively up-to-date packages from the repos. It doesn’t really push technology I consider undesirable, like Snaps. Even though I have to rely on RPMFusion for a number of proprietary parts, due to Fedora’s free software stance, I don’t have any particular qualms about that. I also increasingly use Flatpaks anyway.
When I used to use Reddit the /r/fedora community was helpful and welcoming.
One downside is because the kernel changes frequently, and I (sadly) own a Nvidia GPU, akmods runs very often. Another downside is sometimes that frequently changing kernel can cause issues. I think in the past year or two I’ve had two distinct occasions where a kernel upgrade caused my mounted shares to not mount correctly. Reporting an issue to upstream also takes quite some involvement, as I discovered when I had to create some Red Hat account to report an issue about the packaging of some software in a beta release of Fedora.
So all-in-all I would say Fedora is a strong distro. It is probably not the most beginner-friendly one, though, given how you have to dip your toes into RPMFusion and related challenges. It used to be worse, since DejaVu used to be the default font system-wide and you had to install a fonts package from COPR to make the system actually look pleasant. Since then they switched to Noto, which makes the font situation MUCH better.
On servers and VMs I use Debian because I do not have the patience to maintain a faster moving Fedora multiple times over. This is exacerbated by the awful defaults of Gnome, which I have to bend into shape with extensions. When Fedora 40 releases later this year I fully intend to reinstall from scratch since KDE Plasma 6 will be available.
edit: i misread the prompt and just talked about my favorite distro that i actively use. whoops.
My least favorite distro could be Manjaro if I actually used it, but it is Ubuntu because of how close it is to being a great distro. Snaps really soured me to that deal. Snapd and Snaps make it difficult to use in VMs, too, because now you have to over-commit resources for something that could and should be smaller and simpler. Debian stays winning, as usual.
