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this post was submitted on 20 Oct 2025
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Linux
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Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).
Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.
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I'm old enough to have seen this "flocking" several times. Some people stay and are pleasantly surprised. Most people go back a few weeks/months later, and leave a "Linux suxx" post behind them. I don't expect this time will be any different, and that's totally fine.
Linux is a lot better than the last few times.
It might just be 'good enough' at this point.
I agree. This time, it's actually different. Big name streamers and YouTubers are showing their support. Not just people in the tech industry, but random channels like EmKay and PewDiePie.
Linux is better than ever. Steam is a breeze. Wine support has never been better.
Meanwhile, Windows has more nasty surprises, underhanded backstabs, and security nightmares than ever before.
Dankpods has gone in on Linux too. He did a video about building a Bazzite PC a couple of weeks back.
First time reading that PewDiePie is a "random channel"...
I think a lot of people expect Linux to work like Windows, and that's why they go back to Windows, even if some stuff is easier on Linux.
Many of us probably remember times when we tried to download random applications through a web browser, because that's what Windows expects you to do. People will try that, and be confused, why stuff breaks or not work at all.
I think it's easily good enough for general use. It's only certain types of gamers (anti-cheat support is still pretty terrible), and people who are heavily attached to a specific Windows program that they spend a lot of time using, that will have trouble switching across full time. For everyone else, Linux is superior because it runs so much faster than the now incredibly bloated Windows. Depending on the distro, it's also arguably simpler than Windows too.
Most anticheat actually works fine on Linux like 99%+ of games with anticheat. It's just a handful of titles which I don't even like anyways, except maybe GTA online that don't work. It's also not a limitation of Linux but an intentional choice made by those developers to disable it on Linux. Their stated reason is because it's easier to edit memory and stuff on Linux, so they rather just ban Linux all together instead of banning cheaters or region locking games where cheating is common, like in China. I think the real reason rockstar does it is because they have big investments in Microsoft or something. Either way I have no desire to support windows, there are plenty of games that I play, nearly all of them in fact, that work just fine on Linux. There is like maybe 2 that won't.
This isn't true and dismissing the anti-cheat issues because you don't play these games is quite ignorant when they are some of the most played in the world. Just off the top of my head, all Battlefield games, PUBG, Apex Legends, Valorant, Rainbow Six Siege, Escape from Tarkov, League of Legends, Fortnite, Destiny 2...
What? Nothing I said was untrue not a single thing. You are just making up stuff which is honestly pathetic. How about tell the truth you psycho? Also all those games suck, and pubg worked the last time I played it so I don't even believe your list. You are probably lying about that too.
Most of those games actually used to work just fine until they intentionally made them not work on Linux.
That's why saying the anticheat doesn't work on Linux is misleading and wrong. It works on Linux just fine, they just choose to make it not support Linux with a configuration option.
???????
I was one of those nomadic users, every year, since 1998 with Mandrake Linux.
I have always been in love with the idea of an open source OS, but if I couldn't game and work on it, it wasn't ready. Every year, until Valve made it easy to game on Linux.
I made the switch when Proton was released and never looked back.
My point is, every time users go back to Windows, they have their own personal reasons, but those will some day not be the truth anymore.
many people will go back, but of these, i’m sure many will also come back eventually
i’ve tried a bunch of distros in my last 2 years with windows. many didn’t satisfy my needs at the time, so i stayed on windows.
but now, it’s been over a year since I definitely switched to linux, and over 6 months since i nuked (accidentally, but shhh) my windows partition. and i don’t plan on going back anytime soon.
Yeah it's been a long road for me to be fully Linux on my personal systems. I think I started messing with Linux circa 1997 and didn't switch over fully until I think Windows 7 went EoL.
I’ve looked at Linux for years but it was always so intimidating to me. I finally installed it when my pc was being aged out of windows 10 and honestly it’s really fun to play around with even though I’m not super tech savvy. It’s easy enough to find a solution online if I run into any problems and everything is free!
But this time Linux actually plays video games right out of the box. No trickery. Just install steam and the rest of the experience is smooth as butter
And sometimes with better performance than windows because of less of a system overhead.
Desktops only frankly became remotely useable to normal people with recent revisions of things like kde...
Between that and software actually finally started becoming remotely reliable in like 2022-2023 for your avg windows user.
Comparing the past to now is not reliable fair.
More progress towards making things normal user friendly have happened in the last 3-5 years then the last 20.
Let me guess, you might have tried Linux on n the past but only really started using Linux full time around 2021/2022, because every time I see someone saying "Linux only became user friendly around year X" is always around a 1 year mark after they started using it daily, because it's a lot more a matter of being used to than actual usability. I have been using KDE since 2004, and while things have changed it wasn't all that much, I don't remember any big usability refactor or anything of the sort happening, I'm fairly confident that if I were to put you to use a KDE 3.5 UI you would feel right at home.
And also other operating systems are becoming terrible in recent years. So double plus good for Linux.
my buddy wanted to switch from w10 to mint and i tried to recommend kubuntu because of wayland, i told him mint will be laggy because he has many screens with different refresh rates and mint can't handle that. he wouldn't listen, installed mint, and a few weeks later went back to w10 raging how linux suxx it's so laggy. could've just installed kubuntu but no, it had to be w10.
That's an Nvidia issue, not linux.
Seconding this because I have had that issue. Switched over to an AMD card and life was good.
Many people will definitely go back, but the percentage staying might be better this time around. Linux has gotten a lot more usable and stable for those tech inclinced enough to be able to install it thanks in part to proton, immutable distros, flatpacks, Wayland, and improved defaults. Mint and bazzite are pretty darn good for daily use. I've never stayed on Linux as long as I have with this run, and I really don't feel much of a push to leave it. Most everything I want to do just works.
Linux usage has been trending up over time. It's real.