I know Gnome is the default on popular distros: Fedora, Ubuntu, Rhel, Pop OS (it’s Cosmic Desktop yes but it is still based on Gnome)…etc. But Gnome just doesnt work for me. I would pick XFCE - stable and no BS.
Before Manjaro and their cetificate shenanigan, I used to use their XFCE version. At the time, it was marketed as the “Flagship Manjaro version”. I went 4 years without any problems and I did tinker a lot, just couldnt get their XFCE to break.
After a tough Arch or Gentoo installs, I just want to put XFCE on and call it a day.
What about you guys?
KDE, it’s the swiss army knife of DEs.
KDE, always
Used it since I switched to the Linux Desktop 25 years ago. Quickly tried gnome, and others, and hated it.
KDE is fast, efficient, looks awesome, is ready to work with, and highly customizable
KDE plasma. Coming from 30 years of running exclusively windows it’s just the most comfortable and easy for me to use (way more than Gnome). Easily configurable, works. Can’t ask for more.
KDE plasma, unless it’s on a tablet, then Gnome
KDE Plasma for ease of use if using Nvidia Otherwise Hyprland or exwm
Probably KDE, it’s the most ‘complete’ feeling to me with settings and GUI for most things.
I would say the same & I don’t even use it—but I would trust it being around the longest & is better than GNOME IMO.
MATE has been on most of my machines, except the BSD ones.
But past year or so, I have grown a fondness towards ctwm, and gradually migrated my machines to it, Linux and BSD alike.
It is not a DE, but the fact that I have to assemble my suite of software myself on my machines, makes the point of using DEs moot.
Cinnamon for 2 reasons
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KDE is missing a lot of features which still only works in Gnome. Like the taskbar Calendar app syncing events with services like Google Calendar
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cinnamon is extremely stable and doesn’t move your icons around when you connect to an external display with your laptop and the display has a different resolution.
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KDE. Been upgrading the same environment for 5 years just keeps getting better.
I started around maybe KDE 3?
Was on KDE 2, KDE 3 was absolutely incredible, ran it on Mac when it was supported on xquartz.
4 was a mess, but got better, 5 & 6 are fine, but it’s overall far better than any other DE, it’s just so customizable, the only other thing that comes close is xmonad or something.
Glad KDE has been putting major efforts over recent years into improving stability instead of just adding features.
I mean, they added a ton of features, especially minor or niche ones, but a lot of amazing ones like KDEConnect too.
But what makes KDE the best is that the features don’t get in the way of core functionality anymore, the basic DE is always safe and they generally layer stuff on such that it doesn’t break anything.
So basically the opposite of most of modern software nowadays.
KDE the customization is off the charts
i3
best tiling on XI am absolutely with you about i3. Simply great (there is also dwm or qtile)! But it is a WM, not a DE, what OP asked about.
fair
xfce+i3 i guess
You mean switching between the DE xfce and the WM i3wm, right? Yep, this works and it can indeed make life sometimes easier to have a DE and a WM aside each other.
yeah, basically just running xfce but replacing xfwm4 with i3
i was kinda surprised how well it worked tbh, i had been using i3 on it’s own for like a year before i tried itOh, I did not know about the possibility of replacing xfwm4 with i3. I too am using i3 for some years and like a lot to have a clean surface which facilitates focussing on my tasks. However, never thought about integrating it in a DE.
Switched from i3 to sway to hyland. I like the virtual desktop setup and noiseless facing interaction.
I’m a long time supporter of Xfce, but I have to say Cinnamon these days. It’s light on resources while being feature rich. Also it’s the default on Mint and it just works.
I use XFCE, but I like Cinnamon too. I use Nemo and Xed instead of Thunar and…whatever.
This isn’t even hard. KDE without a second thought.
I regularly try other desktops, and I regularly come back to the only desktop with any sort of reasonable thought put into it.
That’s not too hard a question for me, I’ve been using the same DE for years: KDE
KDE is one of the main reasons for me to use Linux. I immensely like the performance, silence and battery lifetime of MacBooks. But if I have to work with anything but KDE, it’s not worth it for me. The only thing OSX does better than basically any other desktop out there, is the ability to drag whole virtual screen between monitors.
I’m running XFCE (but you could do KDE) on my intel Mac, you can get best of both worlds. I heard silicon is more difficult with Linux tho.
Has KDE improved since 2010-ish? I gave up KDE because gnome was just a better DE at the time. Gnome sucks now, but I found i3/sway. Haven’t given KDE a second chance yet
Oh yes. Much better since the KDE4 branch / debacle.
