this post was submitted on 13 Jan 2026
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TL;DR: Ubuntu + KDE Plasma (=Kubuntu) + X11 (Wayland fucks with my Firefox)
First thing to acknowledge about Linux is that you have 2 choices in front of you about how you want to configure your operating system:
Distro, and desktop environment.
A distro or distribution for short is the part of the operating system that runs programs, updates them, etc. A distro like Ubuntu will incorporate different code syntactically than another distro like Fedora, but will largely perform the same actions. For instance, to update all of your apps/programs in Ubuntu, you would run sudo apt-get update. To do the same thing in Fedora, you would run sudo dnf update. Other than that, different distros might be optimized for some things over others. Bazzite and SteamOS are distros that optimize for gaming, while Debian is optimized for long-term stability for things like servers.
Desktop environment (DE) on the other hand is all about what you see on your screen. It's the visual portion of your operating system. In my opinion, the choice of DE for you comes down to what's comfortable to use and/or what you grew up with previously. So if you grew up using Windows computers, then DEs like KDE Plasma or Cinnamon would work for you. If you grew up on Mac computers instead, Gnome would be your best choice.
For me, I got exposed to Linux with my Steam Deck, so I wanted to mirror the Deck's Desktop Mode on my laptop. The Steam Deck uses ~~Fedora~~ Arch as the distro and KDE Plasma as the DE. I changed the distro for my new Framework laptop to Ubuntu because I'm more familiar with that, having used Ubuntu computers in middle and high school and dabbling with Ubuntu virtual machines on Windows in the past. KDE Plasma is chill because it reminds me of Windows the most.
And of course, distro and DE aren't the only choices you have on Linux... You have your display server engine like X11 or Wayland, and the seemingly limitless assortment of Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) alternatives to your favorite apps/programs on Windows/Mac/Android/iOS.
Edit: Steam Deck uses the Arch distro instead of Fedora.
Solid write up!! One correction though, steam deck uses their own version of arch for the distro, Bazzite is running Fedora under the hood though.
Ahh, that's right. It's Arch, not Fedora.
I'll make the edit! Thanks
If you want a gaming focused Arch distro, Garuda has been easy and hassle free for me.
cachyOS too. i've heard good things about it
I really liked Garuda but I had to switch because my NVIDIA drivers kept breaking :(
Funny, because I had the opposite problem with my laptop... Bazzite couldn't seem to keep the nvidia gpu happy and working so I switched to Garuda and it hasn't had a problem gaming since.
I love Linux, but hate the user-to-user inconsistency - it really makes answering the #1 question "which distro should I use" basically impossible to answer. Go download all of them that sound interesting and put them on flash drives and try them out in live environment - narrow down to the ones you like the look of the most, and then install them and try it out and see if you can do what you need or not. It's not a difficult process but it is a process and there is no simple answer.