I use and love Arch, but it's definitely not for everyone.
this post was submitted on 13 Jan 2026
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Mint is pretty much the de facto recommendation for absolute beginners freshly moving away from Windows right now, but LMDE especially will be subject to dealing with older software.
Otoh, any of the Puppy distros are a great option for genuinely old hardware; think AM2+/775 or older, that a lot of heavier distros may or may not struggle on.
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GentOwO gang!
Debian Stanle, everyone else lies.
I just want it to work and not spy on me. It's not part of my self-image, I don't even own a Tux shirt. It's just a tool.
I run Mint. It works. I'm happy.
Good analogy by using cars. You can test drive a car. Since a lot (all?) distros have a way to run off a USB, so you can get the general "feel" of it. Then you can go from there. Or if you have room to work with, setting up dual boot isn't that hard (outside of how Windows acts sometimes about it). Asking a lot of people what flavor ice cream they prefer isn't going to help you decide your own.
The easiest way would be getting the cheapest SSD (even 30 GB is enough for most distros), swap your current disk with it, play around, and return where you were, if you donβt like anything.
Guys, what's the best Linux distro to install on my PC?
The one you don't need to install
I have used quite a few, but my longest used ones, in order, are ZorinOS, Linux Mint, KDE Neon, and now Bazzite.
I'd only shoot recommendations once I hear your use case, experience, and willingness to learn
Surprised I had to scroll so far to see ZorinOS mentioned. I love it, and it's pretty user friendly for people new to Linux
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Debian for my workstation desktops, servers, etc, anything that's stable.
Arch for playing around with new toys/features.
Debian is what you get if "dad getting off the couch noise" was a Linux distro.
https://socially.drinkingatmy.computer/objects/4df5b6b4-102f-4854-8721-480d56380e0c
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Unless its like arch or gentoo does the distro matter that much? Like its mostly just the default settings which you can tweak. I feel like 90% of distrohopping is just wanting to try a new UI which can you just install yourself.
The main difference is package management so rolling release vs LTS vs 6 month cycle.
In practice we really need to stop using dynamic dependencies/package managers for most applications, for desktop usecase its just not a good pattern anymore, honestly I feel its like 99% of the reason the linux desktop never took off, app dev is just a pain. Thankfully stuff like flatpak and appimage exist now
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Currently loving Ultramarine on my laptop and Chromebook/Chrultrabook. Use Bazzite on the gaming PC.