What is the most secure Linux distro?

Question

31

Options
Considered

558

User
Recs.

Aug 23, 2023

Last
Updated

Here’s the Deal

The Best 1 of 29 OptionsWhy?

What is the most secure Linux distro	Price	Based On	Default Desktop Environment
91 Qubes OS	-	Fedora/Xen	Xfce4
79 Tails	-	Debian	GNOME
78 Whonix	-	Debian	KDE
73 Gentoo Linux	-	-	-
-- Devuan GNU+Linux	-	Debian	Cinnamon, KDE Plasma, LXQt, MATE and XFCE

See Full List

28 Other Options Considered

Tails

Top Pro

Has TOR built-in

Use the Internet anonymously and circumvent censorship; all connections to the Internet are forced to go through the Tor network. See More

Top Con

Only GNOME desktop environment

Specs

Based On:Debian

Default Desktop Environment:GNOME

Release Schedule:Point(6 Weeks)

Package Manager:Debian Package Manager

See All Specs

Top Pro

Privacy focused

Top Con

Slow internet

Tails uses the TOR network and as a result the internet on your computer will be very slow. See More

Top Pro

Easy to use with an USB key

Top Con

Not for daily use

Tails is a privacy focused Linux distro. The updates that you will receive are only for improving privacy and not for improving user experience. See More

Top Pro

Live Distro

So it is more secure. See More

Top Con

Saved states are not present for security

For security reasons, saved states are not supported in Tails. Files can be stored in a separate, persistent volume which must be accessed with a root password. Personal settings (e.g. -- keyboard layout, window settings, etc.) are not saved persistently across reboots. This can be a hindrance for anyone not using English as their language, or not using a QWERTY keyboard layout. See More

Top Con

You can't install it to a hard drive

Top Con

Live distro

It's made as a live distro, so it is no replacement for a traditional OS. See More

Top Con

Uses Systemd

See All

Whonix

Default Desktop Environment:KDE

Main Usage:Live Desktop, Privacy

Gentoo Linux

Top Pro

Freedom

You are free to do whatever you want with it. As a result, its configuration reflects your unique taste and personality. See More

Top Con

Since everything must be compiled it takes a lot longer to update

And if you have to update the kernel or some heavy software like Chromium it can takes hours if not more on weaker hardware. See More

DreamerWadjWer's Experience

Its not gonna be easy See More

Top Pro

Full control of the software

You build the package from a source you can see and read. You decide which features you want to build in and which aren't needed. You can choose build options, optimisation and whatever else fancy stuff you want modified. With a binary distribution this simply isn't possible. See More

Top Pro

Can by optimized to any given CPU by using proper compile flags

Since everything is being built on your PC you can fine-tune the code to make use of your CPU. And all it requires is two lines of string variables in a global config. See More

Top Pro

Fully customizable

The usage of advanced features like USE flags makes it more customizable than any binary distribution. See More

Top Pro

Gentoo does not impose a standard look-and-feel

Top Pro

A very large collection of software is available

There are more than 19.000 packages available in the official repository. And even more with overlays. See More

Top Pro

Documentation and community are second to none

Provides a whole handbook to refer to during setup and usage. See More

Top Pro

Portability

There are many architectures available for Gentoo : i386, x86-64, PowerPC, PowerPC 64, sparc, DEC Alpha, ARM, MIPS, PA-RISC, S390, IA-64, sh, m68k. See More

Top Pro

Can be officially systemd-free

Gentoo's default init system is OpenRC. Gentoo also officially supports systemd-free Gnome and udev. Users are free to choose any init system they want. See More

Top Pro

Great for anyone who is serious about learning the intricacies of Linux

It's useful for both beginners and professionals. For the installation, Gentoo offers various types, which are referred to as stages. Basically meaning how in depth you would want to go into the process of installation. For beginners it's useful to choose for a starting distro due to its various stages that can be very time consuming but beneficial as you learn the composition in general of Linux. See More

Top Pro

Portage's emerge is powerful

Top Pro

Live USB

See All

Devuan GNU+Linux

Top Pro

Stability

It is stable like Debian. See More

Specs

Based On:Debian

Default Desktop Environment:Cinnamon, KDE Plasma, LXQt, MATE and XFCE

Release Schedule:Long-term support (stable edition) and rolling release (testing and unstable editions)

OS Family:GNU/Linux

See All Specs

Top Pro

Very secure

More secure than Debian, because it doesn't use Systemd. See More

Top Pro

It's Debian

Devuan is Debian just without systemd, it just mirrors the the Debian archive and repacks packages that have hard dependencies on systemd. See More

Top Pro

Init based

Isn't based on systemd which can spread malware into your system. See More

Top Pro

Debian without systemd

Top Pro

Most decent look amongst other XFCE distros

Default XFCE theme is unique of all the XFCE distos including MXLinux, Xubuntu etc. See More

Top Pro

Excellent for normal people

It is easy to use and is a good choice for beginners. See More

See All

Debian GNU/Linux

Top Con

Internal quarrels harm the project

Instead of working all together to provide the best Operating System, some maintainers are just ignorant and aggressive to new ideas or new maintainers. That led to many crises and controversy in Debian's history. See More

Top Pro

Highly secure system

Known for being consistent in maintaining a highly secure system. Several other popular distros use Debian as a base or core for their own Linux OS, the security being one of the main factors why it's so commonly used. See More

CaringGefjun's Experience

It is very stable and secure, but most packages are relatively old. I wouldn't recommend using it on an everyday PC. See More

Specs

Release Schedule:approximately every 24 months

Package Manager:dpkg (Debian Package Manager)

OS Family:GNU/Linux

Official Supported Architectures:amd64 (x86_64), arm64 (aarch64), armel, armhf, i386, mipsel, mips64el, ppc64el, s390x

See All Specs

Top Con

Uses Systemd

Top Pro

Very stable

The stable and oldstable release will favor stability over everything else. See More

egberts's Experience

As a Sr. CyberSecurity researcher, I'm disappointed at the APT/Debian packaging. Hash value does not cover the content of the package, just covers the meta-data (or header) of Debian packages. See More

Top Con

No default support for non-free hardware

Non-free hardware will not work upon install of Debian and the user will need to search out the correct non-free software to install in order to make them work. This can be difficult if one of the things not working is the WiFi connection. See More

Top Pro

Install and forget

Once installed you can almost forget about it and start to use your desktop for your daily tasks See More

PersonableWatiKutjara's Experience

Super sick See More

Top Con

No choices

Debian basically doesn't give you any choices: for example it is very hard to use a different Sound system than ALSA like OSS4, and the same goes for different init systems. See More

Top Pro

Well-working team

The developer works very well so the the code is one of the best written out there. See More

Top Con

Ridiculous package splitting

Even though it makes sense to split devel and the actual binary of an application, the splitting has become as mess in debian and its derivates: for example the nvidia driver is splitted into over 40 different packages. See More

Top Pro

Standard vanilla Linux desktop

Debian runs standard Gnome, XFCE, KDE - it doesn't use its own special desktop environment, which means that users benefit from the work of the whole Linux community, Debian developers can focus on the distribution itself, and any support for your desktop environment on other distributions should work on Debian as well. See More

Top Con

Slow boot

Debian boots very slowly. See More

Top Pro

Wide choice in desktop environments

Debian offers stable and testing CD images specifically built for GNOME (the default), KDE Plasma Workspaces, Xfce and LXDE. Less common window managers such as Enlightenment, Openbox, Fluxbox, GNUstep, IceWM, Window Maker and others can also be installed. See More

Top Con

Debian packaging and its hash values do not cover actual data content, just its header

Yeah, Debian packaging only applies its hash values to cover the meta data and not the actual content of its package. In short, binary transparencies are not maintained. See More

Top Pro

A lot of ways to install software

You can either use aptitude, apt or apt-build to install software from the Debian package archives. See More

Top Pro

Live install images for CDs, DVDs and USB thumb drives

Debian releases live install images for CDs, DVDs and USB thumb drives, for the i386 and amd64 architectures, and with a choice of desktop environments. These Debian Live images allow the user to boot from a removable media and run Debian without affecting the contents of their computer. See More

Top Pro

Comes with over 37,500 packages

Because of its popularity, Debian has a lot of applications available which range from productivity programs to business software, games and development tools. It comes with over 37,500 packages (software that is precompiled and ready to be installed on a local machine) -- all of them for free. See More

Top Pro

Big open-source project

The Debian project is the biggest open source project with over 5000 active contributors. See More

Top Pro

Supports SecureBoot

You don't have to disable SecureBoot if you use it, which is useful for LiveUSB or dualboot setups. See More

Top Pro

Apt-build

It is possible to rebuild the entire system and optimize it for your hardware (of course it is not detailed as Gentoo's USE flags). See More

Top Pro

Extremely easy to find help with any problem

Debian is one of the oldest and most popular distros out there. Debian's popularity means that you will always be able to find a solution for your problem just by searching on Google, or if by chance nobody has had the problem you are having it's very easy to ask the community and quickly get a solution. See More

Top Pro

Wide choice of hardware platforms

Debian has the widest choice of hardware platforms, including: amd64, armel, armhf, i386, ia64, kfreebsd-i386, kfreebsd-amd64, mips, mipsel, powerpc, sparc, s390, s390x, source, multi-arch. See More

Top Pro

Unique release cycle

The most Linux distros have one or two stages before a release, but Debian has five before a new stable version is released (experimental > unstable > testing > code-freeze/bug hunting > stable). See More

Top Pro

Easy to find help with any problem

Debian is one of the oldest and most popular distros out there. Debian's popularity means that you will always be able to find a solution for your problem just by searching on Google, or if by chance nobody has had the problem you are having it's very easy to ask the community and quickly get a solution. See More

Top Pro

Great for gaming

As Debian is the base for SteamOS and because Ubuntu is based on it, it's almost certain that all Linux games will run properly and require no hacks like creating symbolic links because of some hardcoded paths. See More

Top Pro

Has small amount of today's bugs (e.g. no duplicate web cameras in Skype - likely not Skype's fault)

But has not that small amount of bugs from 2016-2017 year for long term. See More

Top Pro

Comes with over 55.500 packages

Because of its popularity, Debian has a lot of applications available which range from productivity programs to business software, games and development tools. It comes with over 55.500 packages (software that is precompiled and ready to be installed on a local machine) -- all of them for free. See More

Top Pro

Widely supported

Almost any software that is available for Linux provides a Debian package. See More

Top Pro

The Debian Social Contract

Guaranteed commitment to adherence to values, principles, priorities, requirements and guidelines by the Debian project. See More

Top Pro

A real installer

Unlike other distributions that just extract their Live image, Debian offers a real traditional and modular installer to customize the installation. See More

Top Pro

Strict separation of non-free software

Debian is one of the few distros that let the user choose if he wants a free system or not. See More

Top Pro

Debconf

Depending how it is configured debconf does the most of the hard work for you and only asks you with configuration/file conflicts. See More

Top Pro

Many ports

Debian supports almost any Kernel maintained CPU instructions set. It has also a few non-Linux ports. See More

Top Pro

Great multi-arch support

You can easily cross compile for many platforms on a Debian-based system. See More

Top Pro

Strict seperation of non-free software

Debian is one of the few distros that let the user choose if he wants a free system or not. See More

See All

Artix Linux

Top Pro

No systemd

Top Con

Few Arch packages might not be available yet

Developers are working migrating all packages into their own repositories while ensuring there's no systemd malware. See More

Specs

Based On:Arch Linux

Default Desktop Environment:Bash (Unix shell), Cinnamon, KDE Plasma, LXDE, LXQt, MATE and XFCE

Release Schedule:Rolling release

Package Manager:Pacman

See All Specs

Top Pro

Flexibility

You can have a functional system in less than 10 mins using GUI installer OR you can do it "the Arch way" See More

Top Pro

runit

Artix actively supports the runit init system known from Void Linux. (Equally besides the OpenRC init system known from Gentoo.) See More

Top Pro

Rolling distro

Top Pro

Lightweight

Only the software you would need like Terminal emulator, file manager, media player and a browser. See More

See All

Void Linux

Top Pro

Very minimal

More minimalistic than Arch since it doesn't use systemd. See More

Specs

Based On:Independent

Default Desktop Environment:CLI, XFCE, Cinnamon, Enlightenment, LXDE, LXQt, MATE, GNOME

Release Schedule:Rolling

Package Manager:XBPS & xbps-src

See All Specs

Top Pro

Very lightweight

Base installation can idle at less than 250 megabytes of RAM. See More

Top Pro

Runit init system

An init system with the "do one thing and do it right" mentality. Void Linux does not support systemd. See More

Top Pro

xbps (X Binary Package System)

A brand new package manager that is fast, full-featured, and tailored specifically for Void Linux. See More

Top Pro

BSD-like improvements with Linux

Full support for LibreSSL, an OpenSSL fork focused on maximizing security. The xbps-src package builder works in a similar manner to BSD's ports collection. See More

Top Pro

Musl image available

Musl libc is lighter and faster than bloated glibc. Musl has been argued to be more secure overall than glibc also but is also not supported by all software. See More

Top Pro

Rolling release

See All

Alpine Linux

Top Pro

Small

Sporting with only a command line interface, Alpine Linux is the smallest Linux distribution, taking only 108MB for the standard image. See More

Top Con

Musl libc

It is good for embed systems due to the lower size compared to GNU libc, however, every precompiled/unfree driver or application will refuse to run. See More

Capuccino 's Experience

Alpine is a distribution designed for experienced Linux users who wants a clean, customizable and secure OS. With a secure-by-default kernel, and with a emphasis for simplicity, Alpine is a choice for users who wants more for less. Be prepared for missing drivers however. See More

Specs

Based On:LEAF Project

Default Desktop Environment:N/A

Release Schedule:Rolling

Package Manager:Alpine Package Keeper

See All Specs

Top Pro

Secure to the kernel

Alpine's main feature is its security. Alpine is designed to be secure from the ground up, having all packages compiled as a position independent executable with stack smashing protection and the kernel with additional security hardenings. This is essential when working with mission-critical workloads See More

Top Con

Some devices won't work

Because Alpine might not come with drivers for your system, chances are when you enter a graphical shell, the video card will not work at all. See More

Top Pro

Built on musl libc

musl is a POSIX-compliant C Library, which is static-linking efficient, stable ABI, and conforms to the POSIX C11 standard. It is smaller than glibc, making it a perfect Library for minimal Linux distributions See More

Top Con

Not Beginner friendly

Alpine Linux is not beginner friendly. The bare bones Command Line Interface and OpenRC is very daunting to work when you have zero experience with Linux. Alpine is designed for experienced users who has intermediate Linux knowledge. See More

Top Pro

Utilities are provided by Busybox

Alpine's core utilities are provided by Busybox. Busybox, OpenRC, and apk-tools is what defines Alpine apart from the others, because a regular distribution uses coreutils, and systemd. The tradeoff is large as the Busybox-based distribution can achieve a smaller size, but with the price of having the unix utilities being not as full-featured as its GNU counterparts. See More

Top Con

Incompatibility with glibc programs

Because Alpine uses musl libc, most of the glibc-compile programs are partially incompatible with musl. To alleviate this, you should install libc6-compat. See More

Top Pro

Easy Repository addition

Repositories can be added via /etc/apk/repositories. The setup is quite easy as you just need to add the repository URL. See More

Top Con

Limited Desktop Environment choices

GNOME DE in the Alpine repository still misses the Mutter Library, a hard dependency for the aforementioned environment. There is also only one greeter, you can't choose from lightdm to gdm, as they do not exist at the moment. See More

Top Pro

Uses OpenRC Init

Because Alpine is designed to be small, It takes off the large systemd init and uses OpenRC. This is a distribution that allows people to write services in regular shell scripts. This is a simple tradeoff to be small and lightweight. See More

Top Con

OpenRC might be cumbersome to set up

OpenRC uses shell scripts to run a service. If you come from a SystemD setup, this can majorly throw you off since you need to learn how classic services works. See More

Top Pro

Alpine Package Manager is very straightforward

apk or the Alpine Package Manager is very straightforward, when adding a package ( apk add) or removing a package ( apk del ), it never asks for your confirmation, and just assumes you want it installed. See More

Top Con

Busybox-based Unix utilities are not as full-featured as its GNU counterparts

Alpine uses Busybox for size reasons. Because of this, Alpine was able to achieve a small Linux distribution with the price of having only a bare-bones Unix utilities that has its core functions, which is not as full-featured as its GNU cousins. See More

See All

Manjaro

Default Desktop Environment:XFCE, KDE Plasma, GNOME

Release Schedule:rolling

Package Manager:pamac

See All Specs

Parabola GNU/Linux-libre

Top Pro

Arch Linux but you got to be crazy to use it

Top Con

Very few packages

Since this is completely "free", you won't find many packages available, so there isn't a lot you can do with Parabola. See More

Specs

Based On:Arch Linux

Default Desktop Environment:LXDE

Release Schedule:Rolling

Package Manager:Pacman

See All Specs

Top Pro

Protects your freedom, certified free by the FSF

Top Con

Same cons that apply to Arch Linux

Top Pro

All the benefits of Arch Linux, only 100% certified free software

Top Con

Won't work out-of-the-box on the most PC's

Almost all PCs need non-free drivers but Parabola has none to offer. See More

Top Pro

Option to use OpenRC or Systemd

Top Con

Incompetent developers

They only care about removing non-free software, rather than making a properly working OS. See More

Top Pro

Very secure

See All

BlackArch

Top Pro

Large repository

The repository contains 2410 tools. See More

Top Con

Not made as a secure distro

It is not made to be secure. Just like Kali or Parrot, it includes tools to test other systems and networks. See More

Top Pro

Suitable for professionals

Top Con

Not Intended for General Desktop Use

BlackArch is an Arch-based distribution designed for penetration testers and security researchers, not regular users. See More

Top Pro

Arch-based

Top Con

Unfriendly for beginners

Top Pro

Live session

You can run the OS from a LiveUSB. See More

Top Pro

Better than ArchStrike

Contains many more tools than ArchStrike and far easier installation than ArchStrike See More

See All

Fedora

Top Pro

Fast performance

Performance in Fedora is quite as fast as its competitors, but always ahead since Red Hat uses the distribution to test new kernel additions ready to be patched to the mainline kernel and other more sophisticated additions from the desktop environment as well. See More

Top Con

Optimus support is straight terrible

Running on a laptop with optimus gpu or the driver for your powerful gpu is not gonna happen. See More

CaringGefjun's Experience

I really like this distro for its integration with GNOME. See More

Specs

Based On:Independent

Default Desktop Environment:GNOME

Release Schedule:Point (6 Months)

Package Manager:RPM Package Manager, DNF package manager

See All Specs

Top Pro

Fast and stable updates

Updates on Fedora are stable since they tend to automatically switch the repositories to the new one on major OS updates and perform package upgrades using Deltas, which is considerably faster than a full package upgrade. See More

Top Con

Focused on binary release debian and worse at source build infrastructure

Arch provide simple and effective buildpkg script and it just works. See More

Capuccino 's Experience

It's no doubt Red Hat has the major lead on Linux development, mainly because of this brainchild of a distribution. They test new innovation that is yet to be released for others, and it has proper SELinux - making it a safe, secure, and bleeding edge, but stable distribution. See More

Top Pro

Strong commitment to free software philosophy

Like Debian, Fedora project is entirely FLOSS (Free, Libre, Open Source), meaning, there are no proprietary drivers included, and all of the included packages on the official repository follows the free software philosophy. See More

Top Con

Too many changes to upstream packages leading to a "Fedora way" of doing things

Linux should be linux, but Fedora is constantly introducing breakage and changes which move things in the wrong direction and make things worse for everyone. See More

Top Pro

Integration with GNOME

It perhaps has the best integration with GNOME (GNOME software works out of the box). See More

Top Con

Windows-like system updates

Top Pro

Focuses on innovation

By using bleeding edge software, Fedora allows for innovation to take place by testing out things which other distros are not willing to try due to fears of having instability issues. See More

Top Con

Proprietary drivers are unsupported

Fedora does not support proprietary drivers, meaning that users may have problems with a lot of hardware when using Fedora. The software to make that kind of hardware work can be installed, but it can be done only through third-parties and it's not easy for the average user. See More

Top Pro

Backed by the biggest Linux kernel contributor

Fedora is backed by RedHat, the biggest Linux kernel contributor in the world. Using a distribution made by RedHat means that it will be fine-tuned to work as efficiently as possible since it's made by the same people who work extensively on the kernel and know its ins and outs. See More

Top Con

Slow

It is quite slow on some computers. See More

Top Pro

Huge array of binary packages ready to install

Unlike Debian and Ubuntu, packages in Fedora are all included that would take a PPA for a Debian-based distribution. If you can't find it, you can install the RPMFusion repository which includes more packages. See More

Top Con

Updating to a new release can be problematic

While there are a few tools on offer that will upgrade an old Fedora release to the newest, there can often be problems with these methods. Some that may not even crop up at first but will show later down the road. Being that upgrading can be an issue, it can be exacerbated by the fact that Fedora updates every six month, which means twice a year there is a risk of completely borking ones install. See More

Top Pro

Spins and Labs

Spins are images with a different WM/DE, and Labs are filled with a specific theme of packages. See More

Top Con

Wayland does not work with Prime/Optimus

On a pc with hybrid video, you must use Gnome on Xorg to let the Prime or Optimus technology work. See More

Top Pro

Can still be installed in a bad sector on the hard disk

Unlike most distributions, Fedora can still install on a bad sector, which allows Fedora to have an edge against distributions who mainly skips bad sectors. See More

Top Pro

Very good integration with Flatpak and Snap Packages

Top Pro

Frees developers from some backward compatibility restraints

Fedora has a relatively short life cycle: version X is supported only until 1 month after version X+2 and with approximately 6 months between versions this means that a version of Fedora is supported for approximately 13 months. This promotes leading-edge software because it frees developers from some backward compatibility restraints. See More

See All

OpenSUSE

Top Pro

Secure and reasonably hardened operating system "out of the box"

Top Con

Limited Firewall software packages that can be overly complex for the average or new Linux user to customize

PleasantKingu's Experience

Primary operating system installed on home PC, a laptop, and a notebook with all using 64 bit arch, ~2 gig harddrive space, and as little as 4 gig RAM. Opensuse is stable and security updates are timely. The YaST administration GUI interface is intuitive and makes the updating or installation of new software packages easy along with quick access to most system settings. Opensuse provides a secure and better than most hardened distro "out of the box" with the ability to further tighten security settings within the YaST interface. I have tried multiple Linux distributions and chose Opensuse for new systems and to replace Windows on older computers without any loss of functionality or performance. See More

Specs

Based On:Jurix>SUSE

Default Desktop Environment:Plasma, GNOME, Xfce, LXQT

Release Schedule:Point (1 year minor releases, 3 years major releases)

Package Manager:RPM Package Manager, zypper

See All Specs

Top Pro

Outstanding community support

OpenSUSE has a VERY active user community. Questions on forums are generally answered in minutes. See More

Top Con

Poor support for nVidia drivers in Tumbleweed

No native driver support and nouveau may be broken, especially for KDE, and not suitable for some GPUs. See More

Top Pro

Very stable

Stable, reliable, rock solid. See More

Top Con

Startup takes a long time

Top Pro

One-Click install

Much better system then other distros for installing any package. It is as simple as clicking on one button and typing in your password. Adds a repo to your system keeping everything updated at the same time. See More

Top Pro

Easy installation and administration

openSUSE makes use of a GUI tool called YaST to install and setup an openSUSE system. YaST is very easy to use and makes the process of installing and maintaining an openSUSE installation a breeze. See More

Top Pro

Extremely reliable

The packaging team is dependable resulting in system updates that come in a timely fashion and systems which rarely, if ever, break due to packaging. The versions of software that are selected and the configuration of them is typically extremely high quality. See More

Top Pro

Easily get packages from other sources

SUSE Build Service offers packages from the same sources as Fedora, Debian, Ubuntu, SUSE Linux Enterprise and other distributions. This is the most underused package tool in Linux today. See More

Top Pro

Convenient package management with Zypper

Fast, reliable, powerful and almost impossible to leave a broken system. The Yast interface will also give you access to a Zypper GUI if you are uncomfortable with the command line. See More

Top Pro

Amazing choice for both newbies and power users

OpenSUSE is very easy in terms of installing packages, administration and customization, yet very powerful in the same. Every user should find his own piece of cake in this OS. See More

Top Pro

Dedicated professional community

Directions on other desktop Linux's often force you to use GUI packages or have steps that introduce security issues. OpenSUSE has a professional community and directions are usually geared toward GUI and CLI with similar steps. See More

Top Pro

Probably the best KDE desktop experience

Both Gnome and KDE desktop options are well polished to fit with the opensuse theme and environement, so either desktop is a great choice. See More

Top Pro

"Tumbleweed" Rolling Release

Regular and easy upgrades to stable and well tested software. See More

Top Pro

Built-in drivers

Does the job needed and has the hardware drivers for the application built-in by the H/W supplier. See More

Top Pro

Supports RPM packages

Popular format shared with distros like Fedora, RHEL, Scientific Linux, Mageia etc. See More

See All

Parrot Security OS

Top Pro

Privacy

NixOS

Top Pro

Allows parallel configurations for multiple projects

As everything is isolated, you can have on the same machine multiple configurations to meet project requirements that would be mutually exclusive on other OSes. See More

Top Con

The configuration language is hard to figure out

For good reason. It's a purely functional language. However not even close to bash. See More

Top Pro

Extremely reproducible state of installation

Every package in your system is generated from a configuration file. This makes it very easy to reproduce that environment. Just copy the config file into a new machine and it's done. See More

Top Pro

Has docker like system built in

Top Pro

Great for Haskell development

It has all of hackage in it's package manager (which is confusingly named "nix" as well) due to being based around hashing and allowing you to compile in a sort of virtual machine (really just changing the PATH variable temporarily) it solves many of the versioning problems that you commonly have with cabal. Here's a tutorial (there's many others as well) http://www.cse.chalmers.se/~bernardy/nix.html. You can also use the package manager a la carte on Mac and most any linux distro. See More

Top Pro

Versatile snapshot system

You can use and test snapshots without rebooting. Booting into snapshots or test configurations is possible without risking the system's stability. See More

Top Pro

Upgrading the system is extremely reliable

Since NixOS stores all its packages in isolation from each other in /nix/store and because of the declarative configuration model, upgrading NoxOS systems is extremely reliable. Furthermore, it gives you the ability to roll back upgrades. See More

See All

Slackware

Based On:Softlanding Linux System

Default Desktop Environment:KDE SC

Release Schedule:Point or Rolling(Slackware - current)

Package Manager:Pkgtool

See All Specs

CentOS

Top Con

The project is dying, use rocky linux.

Top Pro

Greatly favours stability over anything else

CentOS favours stability over being up-to date. For this reason it ships with packages that may be up to two years behind in order to ensure stability over everything else. Using older versions for packages means that they have been thoroughly tested and used in production for quite some time, and are ensured to play well with each-other. This strategy has paid off quite a lot in the past. One example is the Heartbleed bug which left CentOS unaffected since it was using a two-year old OpenSSL library which did not have the bug. See More

Specs

Based On:Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL Source)

Default Desktop Environment:GNOME

Release Schedule:Point (Concurrent with RHEL)

Package Manager:RPM Package Manager

See All Specs

Top Pro

Good long term support

See All

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Qubes OS

Top Pro

Allows you to easily compartmentalize different applications using virtualization

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AwesomestNekhbet's Experience

Most secure See More

Specs

Based On:Fedora/Xen

Default Desktop Environment:Xfce4

Top Pro

Allows using different OS seamlessly using virtualization

Top Pro

Whonix out of box

The Best 1 of 29 OptionsWhy?

My Recommendation for Qubes OS

My Recommendation for Qubes OS

Allows you to easily compartmentalize different applications using virtualization

Allows using different OS seamlessly using virtualization

Whonix out of box

28 Other Options Considered

My Recommendation for Tails

My Recommendation for Tails

Has TOR built-in

Only GNOME desktop environment

Privacy focused

Slow internet

Easy to use with an USB key

Not for daily use

Live Distro

Saved states are not present for security

You can't install it to a hard drive

Live distro

Uses Systemd

My Recommendation for Whonix

My Recommendation for Whonix

My Recommendation for Gentoo Linux

My Recommendation for Gentoo Linux

Freedom

Since everything must be compiled it takes a lot longer to update

Full control of the software

Can by optimized to any given CPU by using proper compile flags

Fully customizable

Gentoo does not impose a standard look-and-feel

A very large collection of software is available

Documentation and community are second to none

Portability

Can be officially systemd-free

Great for anyone who is serious about learning the intricacies of Linux

Portage's emerge is powerful

Live USB

My Recommendation for Devuan GNU+Linux

My Recommendation for Devuan GNU+Linux

Stability

Very secure

It's Debian

Init based

Debian without systemd

Most decent look amongst other XFCE distros

Excellent for normal people

My Recommendation for Debian GNU/Linux

My Recommendation for Debian GNU/Linux

Internal quarrels harm the project

Highly secure system

Uses Systemd

Very stable

No default support for non-free hardware

Install and forget

No choices

Well-working team

Ridiculous package splitting

Standard vanilla Linux desktop

Slow boot

Wide choice in desktop environments

Debian packaging and its hash values do not cover actual data content, just its header

A lot of ways to install software

Live install images for CDs, DVDs and USB thumb drives

Comes with over 37,500 packages

Big open-source project

Supports SecureBoot

Apt-build

Extremely easy to find help with any problem

Wide choice of hardware platforms

Unique release cycle

Easy to find help with any problem

Great for gaming

Has small amount of today's bugs (e.g. no duplicate web cameras in Skype - likely not Skype's fault)

Comes with over 55.500 packages

Widely supported

The Debian Social Contract

A real installer

Strict separation of non-free software

Debconf

Many ports