Published May 11, 2026, 5:30 PM EDT João has been covering the tech world for over 7 years, with a heavy focus on laptops and the Windows ecosystem. I also love all things tech and videogames, especially Nintendo, which he's always happy to talk about. Prior to joining XDA in 2021, he worked at Neowin: https://www.neowin.net/news/poster/jo%C3%A3o-carrasqueira/ As great as Linux can be, it's easy to look at the sheer number of desktops and distros you can use and be overwhelmed by all the differences between them. The truth is we often talk about Linux in contrast to Windows, but the latest Windows version only has one desktop paradigm, and even across versions, it doesn't tend to change that dramatically; so, having different Linux platforms be so radically different on the surface can be confusing. But these days, things aren't as bad as they used to be. Yes, there are still a ton of Linux desktops and distros, and I've tried a lot of them.…