Found an Ubuntu CD on the ground and took it home. It resurrected a dead laptop and since then I've only known the kiss of Linus

My original windows 10 PC died so I built a new one from scratch. I didn't like windows 11 AI features they were pushing so I installed Linux. I mostly play steam games and web browse and that's all I need

Because Windows 10 installed candy crush without my input and interrupted me to tell me how edgy it was.

I am old, I have used windows for around 20 years. I am also a geek. I tried Mac OS a long time ago - not geeky enough and the hardware was too expensive for me back then.

Tried Linux several times. It was fun, but I had too many issues, up until now.

In my opinion if you plot user friendliness over time for Linux and windows, the Linux is going up on the friendliness axis, slowly but steadily. Windows on the other hand... Goes somewhere. Every good idea MS devs have is countered by 3 terrible (for users) from the marketing department.

I want to be the owner of my own PC. I want to control everything, windows was good enough a few years ago, but it is not anymore, the cloud integration plus AI bulshit, plus bloatware.

No, thanks.

Windows 11 kept putting up "helpful hints" and kept asking me to set up a OneDrive, and would randomly reboot itself when not in use (which is a pain in the ass for a server system), so after about 6 months of enduring, I nuked it and put Lubuntu on it. Now it works almost perfectly.

My gaming pc is still windows 11, and I'm afraid to put Linux on it because I bricked my previous laptop doing that, and my gaming pc was expensive and is nice. Someday I'll get really fed up with having to specify "no, windows -- I don't want to save this to your cloud. I want to save it to my hard drive" but for now, I'm dealing with it.

It was maybe 2003, and my Windows (XP I guess) was not working properly for like the third time this year, requiring a re-installation. I rad a home linux server (IP masquerading) at that time, and this has gotten me a student job administrating a web and a mail server, so I felt confident enough. This was when I first installed linux on my main machine. But I was dual boot or dual machine until end of 2025, when I finally got rid of my old gaming box and put CachyOS on my new rig.

Okay, a few years earlier a friend gifted me some slackware 1.0 CD, that partitioned my 800MB hdd into a 300 and a 800MB parition. The joy about the extra 300MB linux gifted me did not last too long when everything corrupted, and I went back to windows.

Using windows, which I have to do some times at work, feels so painful now.

So I have control of my computers. Windows has been getting worse, and worse for a long time, apathy is the only reason to stick with it. Pick the right distro, and linux can be very user friendly these days.

The internet is poor and I couldn’t setup Windows 11 without it. So I said screw it and installed mint. Haven’t looked back.

I use Nobara, a gaming fork of Fedora on my desktop. I also use plain old Fedora on my laptop.

I game on both, almost everything works without issue.

Freedom.

I started because I heard it's good for programming which turned out to be true. Initially stayed because it was customizable but had windows for games. Now just Linux because it's better for everything I do. I think now people switching to Linux mostly do it because Linux is just better except for niche programs.

Decades worth of windoofs hate. Finally did the full switch a few months ago. I have been using windoofs for gaming only anyway and professionally I already had plenty of Linux experience.

Linux isn't great either though and can be a real pain in the ass. Recently had to fix few lines of code in the kernel, because I had no audio. But the fact that one can do it in principle is already a huge win over windoofs. And although some games stubbornly won't run (stable), a lot do without having to tinker much, thanks to Wine, Proton, and a couple of startup parameters.

Professionally I mainly use Ubuntu, for gaming I did so at first as well but switched to CachyOS recently.

Fed up of all my apps appearing with copilot in them. Fed up of apps like notepad becoming fucking laggy. Its bloody notepad for Christ sake.

I don't care about AI. I don't want it. Every time I uninstalled it all, it just appeared again a week later.

Then I found cachyos and realised I could play all the games I play. Never looked back.

I enjoy not feeling spied on. Not feeling my data is being sold on.

so i can scroll unfocused windows with the mouse wheel

I was experimenting with Linux for a long time, but haven't migrated fully. W11 was the breaking point for me. Everything built with unnecessarily heavy Electron making the user experience much slower than W10 pretty much forced my hand.

Steam Deck made gaming on Linux possible and that was the only thing holding me to Windows. I had been using Windows since Windows 95.

Microsoft simply stopped making an OS and started making a subscription and content delivery platform. When they did that, they lost me as a customer.

Im a hater and spite is a powerful motivator

The Windows key that I had been using for years stopped working. It was an old Win 8 key that I had updated to 10 then 11. Had to refresh the OS due to a random corruption and my Windows key wouldn’t verify. When I contacted Microsoft support they told me that since I don’t use a Microsoft account my registration wasn’t backed up. They don’t accept upgrades from Windows 8 anymore, so I would have to buy a new key. Instead I found a new OS.

microslop started being cringe. tried linux on a whim. never looked back.

Windows showed me one too many ads in the start menu.

Also, I found a distro I like and can stick with forever.

I got tired of Microsoft. I had seen that Linux was now good enough for what I wanted to so, so I decided to jump ship.

It wasn't a quick decision. I only transitioned from Windows because I finally got around upgrading the PC.

So far? I mean, there was the kerfuffle with the AUR recently. And I still haven't figured out a few issues here and there. But damn it just works and there is no worrying about updating or not updating or anything like it.

Freedom. Having my computer not actively work against me.

Privacy performance and fun

What can I say? I wanna be the very best, like no one ever was. To catch them all is my real quest, to train them is my cause.

Windows is slow, buggy, and overall shit software, even on high end computers.

I never bought into the ecosystem. My first laptop had os/2 warp, then I moved to slackware for years. After that onto FreeBSD when I became a sysadmin. I was turned onto Ubuntu by one of our developers (12.04) and then ended up on Debian when I started gaming. Played guild wars and bf1942 for years until ea used anticheat that was Linux compatible, but disabled it, then moved away from games with a community so toxic it requires software to stop cheaters. I even had an employer pay for a windows xp cert for me and thought it was the jankiest operating system I'd ever used. It was impossible to update everything, the command line was neutered and it t was so slow compared to everything else I used.

Currently I run proxmox and debian on home servers and cachyos on my laptop and gaming computer. I buy computers with no os, or build from scratch where I can and only choose games based on Linux compatibility. I don't have a need for windows because I've never used it for anything besides software testing. I never understood how windows and a FreeBSD clone became the two biggest players in the market.

Windows is like McDonald's. No one really likes it, but it's ubiquitous, you know you're not going to like it, and you're going to regret it as soon as you bite into it, but you expect that, so you choking it down doesn't seem so bad. It's convenient and a lot of other people eat from there, so you try to convince yourself that it's acceptable for dinner and eat it anyway.

I'd love to noodle about with Haiku, MorphOS and such, but being hopelessly hooked on tiling window managers (Niri particularily), I'm just stuck on unixes...

1. FOSS. I'm a software engineer and making the world a better place and helping others is why I love my job and what I study. FOSS is the thing that can make tge world a better place and help others.

I also have a plethora of technical reasons, but I'm sure others will cover them. Just this ideological and philosophical reason is enough for me to be using Linux.

It's better.

20+ years ago I grew tired of having to constantly buy upgrades or find cracks for Windows and a friend suggested i check out thi s new OS that was coming out called Ubuntu. I believe it was around 2004 when I installed the first distro and I have never looked back. I find it amusing that all my friends and family think im some super hacker because I use linux lol.

Because window is genuinely more of a pain to use in 2026.

I had bought a magazine with a CD-ROM inside... Something called Slackware was written on it.

I was tired of listen the computer fan

It's better.

FOSS and copyleft: I want software built for the good of the public, with good intentions. Anything with corporate licensing us off the table, and ideally so are non-copyleft open source programs as corporations will hijack them for their benefit and privatization.

UNIX Like: It is my preferred workflow for development and everyday use. The windows paradigm is messy, convoluted, and inconsistent by comparison.

Fast, free, customizable: all nice to haves connected to the big two above

Skype and OneDrive. They just WOULD NOT GO THE FUCK AWAY. My hard drive died, so I already lost everything OS related, and re-installing windows 10 was already infuriating me, and then every reboot, even after disabling them, skype and onedrive just kept popping up at boot. I used windows to download i think 8 different distro ISOs, gathered a gaggle of flash drives and set them all up. Then I tried them all out until I landed on one that did everything I wanted it to and haven't looked back. I kept that windows drive for about 6 months before I realized I was never using it and the storage space would be better served reformatted to btrfs for the linux system to use.

Windows bugged Out more and more. I am Just annoyed by the Bad Performance.

Troubleshooting in windows is also a pain. When I've learned how easy the Switch can be done, the Deal was sealed.

I want to use open-source software, developed from people for people. I don't want corporates to exploit my data and take away my freedom.

IT worker, close to 50 years old, only ever could afford low-mid range tech, gamer. Been using windows for over 30 years and linux for 8. Linux works better than windows and it allowed me to improve my tech skills beyond a desktop machine.

i wanted to try something new

Because I feel at home with it

It’s open source and not owned by an evil corporation. It doesn’t have ads. It doesn’t mine my data and sell it to the highest bidder. It doesn’t have AI shoved in every nook and cranny. It’s much lighter to run. I can easily run it on a 10 year old laptop.

I got sick and tired of windows turning onedrive back on and moving my files.

I tried it because even with most of the bloat disabled Microsoft still kept threatening to downgrade me to windows 11, so having heard most games were working through proton and knowing gimp and Firefox run natively I figured it was worth giving it a try.
I stayed because with KDE it feels like an "unlocked" windows, windows with all the annoying parts stripped out, delimited, or fixed. Installing it was simple, customising it was extensive and easy, games run better, GIMP loads faster, installing programs from the bazaar is trivial, and it doesn't run into any more bugs and errors than windows did, so it's just a net upgrade. Weirdly bugs are often easier to diagnose and fix with the help of a search engine too, because the questions and answers tend to be a lot more in depth and informative than you get with windows.

many reasons, already told by others, but the one that made me jump was that it does not install apps without me telling it to.

Obnoxious Windows 10 "upgrade" nag screens on Win 7. If you think you can push me, I'll push back harder. That, and Snowden showing the world that American tech is backdoored all the way to hell and back.

I really like the control and malleability

Independent to the above, using windows feels really, really bad these days.

I swap PCs regularly and I hate how long it takes to install windows.

Also windows borked a games drive once and I never forgave it.

Then I learned all the privacy stuff.

It started because I was poor and resented the idea of paying for software. Then I became a professional developer and the advantages of the OS became more obvious. This was ~15 years ago.

Since then the enshittification of MS has made me more and more confident in my decision.

I didn't choose Linux. Linux chose me.

But in all seriousness, back in 2015, I got a PC that came with Windows 8. It had the horrible, completely unusable Metro UI. But my main gripe with that OS was how it forced me to use Microsoft’s solutions over everything else. Quite often, the PDF files I opened would launch in the Metro PDF reader instead of the one I had chosen. Usually, this kind of things happened after a Windows Update, which 'accidentally' reset my default application choices - including the PDF reader - and, as a final spat in my face, added an Internet Explorer shortcut to my desktop.

I started to feel as if I had no control over my PC anymore; it was Microsoft deciding what software I should use. Then and there I decided it was time to give Linux a chance. I had already noticed how Valve was pushing the gaming industry toward Linux, and I thought, those guys can’t be completely wrong.

A complete and total lack of bullshit.

If something is wrong, there's a concrete reason, no matter how deep the cause and you can always dig far down enough to catch and deal with it.

I like being able to debug stuff.

Windows nowadays does not provide any meaningful logs, so everyone in their forums and such is just guessing around why things won't work.

DirectSound libraries are missing? Install them via a sub menu of a sub menu of a really small text in the settings, wait 20 minutes for a „loading bar” telling you nothing, and guess what problem it had when it just told you no.

Aside from all the bugs like the menu bar just not opening and preview updates being shown with the same size as regular updates (great because older people will just install those updates too)

• I have the radical idea that when I own something, I should actually own it.
• I’m a software engineer, both professionally and hobby. Developing on a non Unix platform is bullshit
• HaikuOS is 20 years too late
• What is the alternative? Windows is user hostile ad infested crap, MacOS is a prettier flavor of user hostile ad infested crap. The BSDs have their place, but a daily desktop or laptop isn’t really it.
• Copyleft FOSS or GTFO
• I don’t do a massive amount of customization, but the things I do I want to have. I know that will be the case with Linux. Who the fuck knows with closed source software
• When I find a bug, missing feature, or something just isn’t right I can fix it, file a bug, or just talk to the actual human beings who wrote it. Good luck with any of that in non-FOSS unless you are spending $$$ on a corporate account.

i like having a usable desktop and a nonblinking disk access led within 30 seconds, including bios and bootloader.

Freedom and customization. I'm a pretty laid back guy but one of the few things I'm super anal about is UI and navigation. I'm sure there's a million reasons why windows chose the UI/UX elements it has along with its (lack of) navigation controls, but I can't fucking stand it. With Linux I can rip the whole thing apart and rebuild it exactly how I want.

On the other hand my wife is in no way technical and just wants it to work. So I rolled mint and she has barely noticed the difference. Options are good.

It was just an extension of my interest in computers since I was young ^ ^ This new, completely different OS fascinated me when I was growing up, and led to me installing Ubuntu on an old laptop. I never made an actual jump to it until I was a few years older, and had Windows slowing down my laptop that I used for work. I jumped onto the Manjaro train that was happening at the time, and eventually ended up installing Arch on my main PC (´･ᴗ･ ` )

Because it's Free Software. Free as in freedom.

I think Haiku was the first FOSS OS I tried, but GNU/Linux was more usable.

I had used FOSS on Windows and Mac OS X before. Apps such as Firefox, and VLC. But didn't really get it until I found and read the gnu.org and fsf.org sites.

For me, I got fed up with Windows 11 updates resetting my settings and even reinstalling copilot. I felt like I had no control over my computer, so I put Linux on it to get some control back.

A lifelong Windows user, dabbled in MacOS too, windows 11 was absolute dogshit, did some research and saw loads of videos about bazzite so dual booted into it, liked it so decided to make it my main OS, I also love learning about computers

Windows 11 was stress. I was spending far too much time keeping it the way I want it - stable, no cloud, no AI. A four hour call with MS tech support (that went in the most idiotic circles) kinda sealed the fate of my new desktop build (old one had a failing MB, no choice but to finally upgrade hardware) and switched both it and another desktop the next day.

Much less stressed now, even when things go weird and wonky.

I've used Linux for over 20 years, it just works and gives me the freedom I want, so there's no reason for me to use anything else.

Same reason as with Google Android. These genocide supporting companies take the liberty to collect and sell my data, manage my hardware and frequently break core functionality with updates to push their slop on me, while adding ads to EVERYTHING. Most updates are not even about security. There is like a 100 reasons, really. I could sum it up as "annoying".

Because I love proper i3 style keyboard based tiling and I can't imagine my workflow without it

Because of Microslop. Who needs more reasons, huh?

Originally because fuck windows 10

Since then it's the sheer joy of it all. It's just fucking cool that a bunch of people just get together and make something that benefits everyone, with dozens of forks that allow for freedom of choice.

I switched to Linux full time because I didn't like Windows Xp. Windows has only gotten worse since then and Linux has only gotten better.

1. Win31 sucked
2. I needed a modem terminal for my 386.

Better software availability/support than BSDs. Refuse to use proprietary software. Plus, there's a lot of software I use that isn't available on Windows or macOS. I've tried to dual boot Windows for gaming before and I just couldn't install most of my usual software on Windows.

I'd been using Windows forever and always stuck to the "rule of two": I skipped Vista and Windows 8, and was holding out to see if a Windows 12 was going to happen. When it didn't, I jumped ship to Linux. 11 took everything I hated about 10 and made it all worse, and that's without even considering all the telemetry. I'd already started using open source software, so that only made it easier to switch.

And for the record, my hardware was plenty new enough to install 11. But boy is it zippier with Linux! Just goes to show how much bloat Windows has. I have to use 11 on my work machine and I hate every minute of it.

My values

Because Windows works as dumbest os for now

Sound randomly staying off, micro sometime works, sometime not, if I try to touch sounds its sometimes just slutter all the system. I checked on viruses by free and paid subscriptioned and-viruses but founs nothing. So the best way to heal was to reinstall system. And I am do this. CachyOS going great, more faster and stable for several years even with bleeding edge updates

I tried Linux multiple times (out of curiosity / contrarianism I guess) until Windows pissed me off enough, while the Steam Deck proved I could reliably run games with minimal tinkering (frankly not any worse than what I had to do on windows).

So I made the jump, and I have not looked back

Running a singular OS—I like that I can run the same system on my current four computers—two servers, one desktop, and one 12 year old Microsoft laptop.

Selfhosting—It started with an interest in Jellyfin and Qbittorrent, which led to running my own server(s), progressing to wanting to learn more Linux and run a singular OS for all devices. I think this point is focused on an interest in selfhosting.

Control—I don't like customizing my systems, its a waste of time, but I enjoy having complete control and ownership over them.

Trust and Privacy—I don't want to use any software that doesn't respect the user enough to show the source.

Freedom—I believe media, software, and information should be open access to all.

i was linux-curious for a long time, finally dipped my toes in with the steam deck and got pushed over the edge by win11

At the time, I needed a system able to handle editing a couple hundred pages document without issues. Windows with word couldn't do it, Linux managed it gracefully despite not even being at 1.0 (and it also handled the network much, much better).

I've been using it ever since.

powershell sucks. RegEdit sucks. Start menu sucks. Can't use Niri. Slow. Can't use it while updating. Inverted backslashes for paths are horrible. The only useful feature is WSL, and if you get rid of all other bullshits, you get Linux.

My initial reason was computation freedom. It got so much better in years, I just take the rest as a great bonus.

Tried Linux out of curiosity. Found it better than Windows for all my use cases. Stuck with it and never went back.

It's a compromise.
It supports modern hardware well enough and the environment is good enough.
I do like the cleaned up state of BSD better, but the missing hardware support is pretty much killing that.

Also, all the machines I'm developing for and controlling are running some kind of RT Linux.
So I don't have that much friction between systems.

I’d been using Linux at work for many years, then self-hosting on Linux. I wasn’t too keen on desktop Linux because popular distros default to Gnome, which I thought was pretty meh, and it wasn’t until I tried Mint that I was compelled to make it a daily driver. I’ve distro hopped a lot and always come back to Mint.

At first privacy and just being tired of microsoft and all but I've found the process rewarding.

I am using Linux since the 90's, so my reasons might be different from "to leave Windows".

I started coding at an early age, so for me, having access to all my tools free-of-charge was a big plus. Add to that the possibility of read the source code of everything, the learning potential was mind blowing.

What started off as a kid as mild interest in something "different." Different in the sense that it was different than that of what I grew up using. Anywhere from the lame old school Mac computers in primary school, to the Windows PCs that were everywhere. I did go to school for a degree in Cyber Security; and of course got my hands on some different Linux distros over the years, so between my younger years of tinkering, and schooling I had exposure to Linux early on.

Fast forward a bit, years and years pass by and I was a Windows user because that was just readily available and accessible and what I had primarily used for most of my life; and I was getting fed up with what Microsoft was doing and pushing. That being said, I initially switched from Windows 10/11 to Arch Linux out of hatred for Microsoft.

Well, my reasoning has changed drastically. It used to be because I hated Microsoft and all of their shenanigans. Now I use Linux out of love for Linux. Sure, I still hate Microsoft; but that is a naturally progression the further I get into my niche.

I love open source, and my beliefs on open source has permeated through other beliefs. I think that the collective of human knowledge should be effectively "open source" and available to all. We shouldn't be limited on what we want to learn just because of a corporation or business entity says they arbitrarily own a subset of knowledge.

Anyways, tldr; started as hate for Microsoft, and turned into genuine love for Linux and Open Source Software.

Windows decided my perfectly functional PC couldn’t run 11, and Linux Mint has no issues running. I’m not getting rid of a perfectly good computer just because Microsoft wants me to. My husband has to use Windows for work and it seems like a huge pain in the ass. I’m not into fiddling with computers, and Linux is at the point now where it feels no more complicated than Windows (and often significantly less complicated).

I started using Linux for science. I was using a Raspberry Pi for a study and got to learn some basic stuff as part of that. Then I started to deploy my own Pis at home for self-hosting different apps I like, like Pihole. I also have an ancient desktop I bought on clearance that was running terribly, so I put Ubuntu on it and that solved a lot of performance issues! I host some stuff on there too.

Cus fuck microsoft/windows, thats why.

I just like a working, customizable PC that I'm in control of. KDE Plasma Desktop is everything Windows should have been, and it's actually for me to control, it's free, and it doesn't push BS on me. Fedora btw

I got a new PC and was really upset at the idea of putting windows on it. The ad lack of ownership of my own hardware, I couldn't do it, and so I installed Linux (again), but this time, it stuck.

Pissed off on windows 11. Couldn't change things I needed or wanted. Didn't allow for basic shit. Kept on giving me ads and other fucking annoying things. Broke a lot slow and pathetic. Wanted a fucking proper start menu back again the place I been using it for last 30 fucking years. Updates took forever and ever and often broke everything and have to reinstall. Can't disable auto update ad settings kept resetting each update.

I just wanted a simple computer that just worked. Turned on and just worked every time. Nothing changes without me changing them. Simple and intuitive.

I tried windows again as a duel boot. It wiped broke my Linux partition because micro crap hates people. Never ever going back unless it's a dedicated machine for the 2 games I rarely play that work slightly better on Windows.

Rather never play games or use the Internet then switch back to windows.

EDIT : got me so mad my Grammer and spelling went out the window. Lol

When the internet was new, hip and cool in 1997 it was the best way for a poor student to really get knees deep into networking and hosting. I just haven't seen much reason to try anything else.

I did use OS X for work when doing iOS development a few years.

And in a perfect world I'd rather run a UNIX certified operating system. Linux support is just so good at the moment that I can't really be bothered.

When I became a professional developer, I felt the friction of windows and package management. I knew of Linux desktop, and had used Ubuntu briefly in around 2008 or 09, and then at the time in 2021 I made the switch to Fedora for ease of dev. And never looked back.

Ah, well, it is less shit than alternatives

Windows: too much ads, AI, telemetry, and just nonsense bullshit in general. MS is a malicious company and this is malicious software.

MacOS: too much Apple bloatware. It mostly stays out of the way but the fact that I can't uninstall it makes me very angry. Also the vast majority of software requires a connected Apple account. The bigger problem is the overpriced and intentionally irreparable, unupgradable and disposable hardware which is inseperable from the software.

Linux: mostly just stays out of my way, requires no account for anything. You know, the way operating systems used to work.

Ideological and practical reasons. It does everything I want how I want and doesn't get in the way.

I subscribe to the philosophy that information should be free, and that computing should be a collaborative effort, driven by community. The world is better when we all work together to improve it.

These days, I’m less gung-ho about the technical merits of free software; I just prefer using systems that feel like they’re trying to work for me rather than exploit me.

My old windows install was so cooked thst I had successfully made an illegal CON file (cygwin?) on NTFS, which Windows would refuse to delete because it should be impossible to make such a file.

After a completely fresh install, the settings app refused to launch after a day and of course sfc/dism did jack all.

Said "screw it" and dual booted Fedora because my previous experience with Ubuntu sucked snd I saw that video of Linus saying he never used Debian or Ubuntu because it didn't used to be user friendly to install. Searched up his preferred distro and it was Fedora.

Kept Windows around for a couple of months for one game until one day windows overwrote grub after an update.

Nuked it again and installed only Fedora. Found out the game now had solid support in proton so I literally did not miss anything from Windows.

I fucking hate windows 11

I care what my computer does the same way I care about what my brain does. Since my computer is just an extension of my brain it needs to be transparent and ownable.

Windows was trash, BeOS didn't take off, and all the good network diagnostic tools were exclusively on *nixes in the early 2000s. Later, the *nixes are better for application development and deployment. They're just built to serve data.

Windows has kind of caught up in the tooling department largely thanks to a VM, but it's still trash. LOL

Idealogically, I can own my tools and modify them if needed. I don't modify them, but hypothetically I could.

I was too poor to buy a windows license for the pc I assembled from dumpster parts. I was also to much a rule follower to pirate windows so that led me to slackware linux and the rest is history.

Values, works better (for me) than any other os, gaming/fun, audio/video editing, code.

runs well on my potato pc, infinite customization, transparent and easy to inspect, made by nerds

Windows XP pushed my off Windows. You can trace all of the crap that annoys people today back to XP where it all started.

As for why I keep choosing it? It is the most reliable and stable OS while having the best workflows. I need a computer for work, Linux is the best tool for that.

It gets out of the way and let's me do my thing. Wether it's work or gaming.

Both Aurora on my laptop and Bazzite on my desktops, have been easier to use and maintain than Windows and OSX.

No ads, no nagging, no maintenance. The included gui and cli app stores give me everything I need. I freaking love it, it's pure bliss. Best computing experience I ever had.

~3 years running Ublue distros. 100% happyness.

Because I have self-respect.

I was dabbling for ~10+ years with Linux out of curiosity, but I was heavily invested in windows since 95. I used and liked vista, survived windows 8, but the moment everything started moving towards big brother I had enough. I was in the early access program and the insider program and I hated the idea of recall. The moment it came out in an early access program it was hacked less than 2 hour in the program, and all data could be extracted from the pictures as banking etc. Thus negating the need of complex viruses, you simply have the data in front of you. Then copilot... The fact that is deeply integrated in to everything like file explorer will break if you try yo remove it etc. I just realized this is not my computer anymore, I can't do anything with it that I want and I am paying premium to own this system.

Moved to Ubuntu, loved it but had some things I did not like, things like forcefull integration of not matured system changes on already proven systems (the rust saga), and other things. Moved to arch and I have been personally using Linux for close to 3 years and never looked back.

All the things I nerd work, those that I want and don't work natively I can try and run somehow and often it works often I have to find an alternative. The things that do not work anymore I don't nerd them. Like ms office, adobe (some already work natively or cloud based), and kernel level anti cheat games... I can save my time in to other games. 99% of the games I want run flawlessly or EVEN better than windows, I wonder why hahah.

Planing to move to fedore for a change at the end of the year :)

It does more of what I want, with less time and work to maintain, more reliable and lower cost than the commercial alternatives.

I started using it 'cause I was working with a lot of Linux nerds and they convinced me to try it out. I liked the politics of the GPL and the potential in the Free ecosystem.

25 years later I refuse to use anything else. Windows & Mac are built to take options away from you, to force you do is your hardware their way, and I hate it. My machine does exactly what I want it to, with hundreds of keyboard shortcuts and a solid UI built atop transparent subsystems. Windows ties my hands while pushing ads and AI into my emails. Mac only "Just Works" if you're using it precisely the way that wasnt you to and exclusively with other iShit. No thanks.

A Windows 10 update brought my decent PC to a halt and at that very moment I had enough.

Nix provides me the tools to create coding environments much easier and faster than usual. So I went a step further and now I run NixOS.

Linux works better then Windows 11. If you don't need Windows for specific software needs, I recommend Linux. If you do need Windows, buy a license off of ebay for cheap.

All games work unless they block you with anti cheat, which are usually the big AAA games like cod/battlefield.

Coding is better on linux.

Had an old laptop with win xp and tried out Ubuntu instead of moving to vista which was terrible.

I still dual booted Windows 7 for many years on my main PC but at some point that was too bloated and I moved permanently to Ubuntu and later Arch.

As a programmer I got to experience the evolution of almost all tools support going from back then "Windows install instructions, Mac install and Linux - you're on your own" to now: "Linux, maybe Mac.. and Windows, just use our Linux VM"!

Took Windows apart until i couldn't anymore what i wanted, because it broke it's fickle update process and i realized, i'm fighting against the system here. That's where i switched 100% to Linux.

Its's free/open source, I get not shitty "upload to the cloud" and generally forced to stuff I don't want, it has the super button where it shows all the apps and I can click right on it, I don't need a task bar. Also sticked to it when I was in college and now it became my main OS.

Because Windows 11 will never touch hardware I own. I've been using it at work for several years, I've experienced first-hand their utter disdain for users, and privacy.

I started running foss apps and loving how small and efficient they were in comparison to what I was used to. At one poit I realized that everything I was using could be used on linux, so I migrated and never went back!

The main reason is to use an open-source system. The secondary reason is to achieve greater digital sovereignty and reduce dependence on US technology companies.

I didn't choose Linux, Linux chose me...when windows got unbearably enshittified.

Although admittedly I'd been using Linux for years beforehand, just not for gaming.

i didnt like w10 with already pre-installed software, from games to random shareware. Didnt like that there where starting to test ads in the start menu or that OneDrive had decided to start operating in the background without notice.

I already had a mac, but didnt like that I could play most games, mainly used it as a work pc for design work. So then I searched and learned that linux was having many changes with proton and wine, and decided to give it a go, and I think its been 3 or 4 years since then. There are things, like graphic design work that I needed to re-learn, but it hasnt affected me greatly. I fully recommend it for most people. Running Mint

I switched to get away from the windows telemetry that started to freak me out, but i stayed for the customization that allows me to completely make it my own, and the fact that linux doesn't do shit in the background without me knowing it and just does what i actually want it to do. I tried using windows again in a dualboot configuration when i wanted to play gta online, plus i ended up needing hdmi 2.1, but i just couldn't do it, it was too frustrating and annoying to use. I bought a dp to hdmi adapter and figured i'd rather give up on anti-cheat games like gta online if it means i never have to touch windows again.

So people won't shout at me online.

If I had to put a name I would say customizability and ease of use. I dual booted for several years, it started as Linux was my programming OS and everything else was on Windows, but organically I started to spend more time on Linux and at some point I noticed Windows had become my gaming system, anything else I was doing in Linux. I fiddled with Wine and some games I could get to run on Linux so I only had to reboot for some games. Then Humble Bundle gave me a few games for Linux and I found other ones that offered Linux builds like Project Zomboid and I decided "you know what? I don't even game all that much, between Humble Bundles and Wine I can probably get enough games to keep me entertained and I don't have to keep dual-booting" so I nuked windows from my system and a short while later Steam came to Linux consolidating my choice.

So yeah, it wasn't that I chose Linux it was that using both for long enough pulled me to one side. I can't tell you exactly what pulled me, but whenever I try to use Windows everything seems so clunky and rigid that I think that played a large role. I remember several times when I had issues on one OS I would jump to the other, the issues in Linux were mostly self-inflicted (even though I didn't knew it at the time), whereas the Windows issues were random, unpredictable and unfixable with time the Linux ones became fixable and even predictable.

The whole point of Linux to me is I have complete freedom, choice and control of my pc.

The price you pay is the same though, you have the freedom, choice and control of everything your pc does, and if you do something wrong you can break it.

Windows protects you from yourself by giving you almost no freedom, choice and control. That way you can't break it.

I've been dabbling for years, but my old computer couldn't run Windows 11. That delay made me wait long enough to see all the recall shit, so my new computer has been Linux since day 1, no dual boot.

Lots of reasons today, but I started out of necessity: a poor kid that couldn't buy new hardware, much less a windows license. Discovered the magic when I picked up a little pre-Chromebook XP mini laptop that the person gave me for $20 because it just couldn't run usably with windows' overhead. Put one of the light Ubuntu distros on it, and damned if that little thing didn't get me through college.

Honestly stoked a real passion for how Linux can be a really effective way to repurpose what would otherwise be e-waste and get it to people who otherwise wouldn't be able to really get into technology all with an opportunity to learn how the machine works.

I'm likely relocating soon, but I've really considered afterwards setting up a local non profit dedicated to flipping old machines like that to get them into poor kids' hands, maybe even with pipelines into basic Linux/terminal learning, security basics, programming, etc for those that show an interest.

Control. I want to control what my PC does and when it reboots. With Microsoft Windows and Apple macOS both I don't have control, these US-based corporations can do to my PC whatever they choose to. With those operating systems I don't feel in control.

I've been a lifelong Windows user since Windows 3.1, and truly feel that Windows 7 was when Windows was at its peak. Windows 11 was the straw that finally broke the camel's back, with all of the constant pushing of Copilot and Office 365 and ads in the start menu and so forth. Fuck that, I bailed out about 2 years ago.

I've dabbled on and off with Linux since Ubuntu used to be distributed on free CD-ROMs, but never stuck with it for long, but things have come a massively long way since those days, and now Linux is very usable as a daily driver for many people. I feel like it brings my computer back under my control instead of someone else's, and isn't always trying to sell me out in the background. I eased into it with Linux Mint, and Fedora 44 with KDE is now my distro of choice.

I still have a Windows 11 installation on a spare 256GB SSD, but I only ever boot it up about once a month just to let it update itself in case I need to use it for something I can't figure out a way to make work on Linux.

All my equipment is 8 years old and I can't afford a new system - not even a basic one. I'm permanently unemployed (until the economy fixes itself) but at least it's put the brakes on wasted money. Now it's just food + rent + transport.

If I want games then there's Xbox and other systems for that, so gaming is not going to entice me back to Windows. Sure there are some games on Steam that aren't on Xbox but I'm still finding dozens of games to play or replay on Xbox.

If I bought a new system in the future I'd put Linux on it again. There may be some occasional issues but it's a lot better than Windows which I see as too commercialised. Microsoft wants me to use their browser and search engine, and any "free" application that I install will have ads and nag me to pay a subscription. On Linux I don't have this problem with my apps and there aren't any pop-ups except tips upon start-up. I really can't go back because it's not for me. I'm not a wealthy person looking to spend $2 a month on cloud storage or buy hundreds of games in 90% sales only to never play them. It isn't my mindset.

I've been using it since 2013-2014. It was for the love of computing first and foremost, then it extended into concerns over Windows 10 telemetry, then it became more and more viable, and here we are.

When I first discovered Linux 20 years ago, I was trying to get a computer up and running for my sister to use to write her homework on. The first distro I tried that mostly worked on that ancient Athlon proc was Ubuntu.

I wound up switching to Ubuntu from Windows XP on my personal computer because I liked that it didn't try to hide anything from me. I could (and did, often resulting in me needing to reinstall) twist all of the knobs and dials of the OS. The entire world of software that was entirely free to use, that I wasn't blocked from using because I was poor....was the icing on the cake.

About 5 years ago, I was gifted a new PC with Windows 10 preinstalled.and I decided to give it a try for a while and as long as I was only playing games, working on a text document, or watching Youtube, it was fine. But as soon as I tried to actually do something either sysadmin related or creative, it felt like the OS constantly fighting me.

WSL helped with the sysadmin stuff (mostly, but not with anything related to Windows itself) but if I was working on music, forget it. It was like working covered wet cement. I was always fighting the OS to do whatever it was I was trying to do.

I wound up wiping it and installing Linux on it after about a year of fighting Windows. First NixOS (which I liked) before going back to the distro I know best. Ubuntu.

For me, now, computers are not the toy they were in my youth. They're a tool. The best tool for a particular job is usually the tool you already know how to use. I know Linux, I can't say the same for Windows.

I've gotten old enough that I no longer have the time to study and really learn how everything in a new OS, or even new piece of software works. So, I stick with what I know until I run into a job that requires me to learn a new tool. Doesn't happen often anymore.

I'm a retired Unix admin and I hate Microsoft and Apple.

I have a better understanding of what's under the hood. I lost the plot with Windows somewhere around Windows 2000. Apple got a pass for a while because OS X is founded on UNIX roots, but even it feels a bit more opaque these days. I was also raised on UNIX (Solaris) systems at Uni back in the 90s as Linux emerged out of Helsinki, and I took it for a spin. Over time, Windows and Mac just fell away. Typing this from my M1 MBP on Asahi.

I started playing with Linux in the late 1990s more out of curiosity. I bought a book on Red Hat Linux 6 that came with an installation CD. I have used Linux off and on since then but now have gone exclusively Linux.

Windows updates and app installs in general are a pain in the ass. Linux is so much nicer to use for these things.

I have an appreciation for FOSS. Even when I was running Windows, I looked for FOSS options when possible.

Gaming has gotten so much better. I am not a heavy gamer but I am glad I can play on Linux when I do.

Also, last but not least, the wife acceptance factor kept me dual booting long after I would have switched. She was using my PC for some tasks and did not want to "learn Linux". I solved that by getting her a PC of her own.

My old laptop works well on Windows 10. Mint does about 99% of that and other stuff I don't do in Windows. The only thing that I miss is a multi monitor setup (and I've been told that CachyOS or KDE Neon would do it).

Originally when I started the move to Linux in 2015, I did it because Windows 10 was wholly incompatible with my ISP. I lived through dial-up, HEO satellite, HSPA, LTE, fixed wireless, and currently fiber. During the period with dealing with HEO satellite, every provider at the time in the US (WildBlue/Exede/Viasat, Hughesnet) had alright speeds at best paired with a very aggressive soft monthly data cap (10 GB, eventually 26GB in like 2018), that would revert the speed capabilities back to 32-96kbps. Upgrading from Windows 7 to Windows 10 was largely a mistake for many reasons, but one of them was the sheer frequency, size, and aggressive nature of how Windows 10 tried to download and apply updates automatically. Windows 10's frequent auto updates would easily eat several gigabytes each month of the tiny data cap. The rest of the amount of idle networking Windows 10 did also didn't help during throttled periods, eating up most of the bandwidth available from just one workstation. Knowing that Windows 10 wouldn't be another Windows 8 and that Microsoft would go forward with 10, I decided to seriously look into alternatives.

Eleven years later, I have virtually no restrictions in hardware nor networking. Despite that, I still use Linux exclusively. Nowadays, there is little to no compromise in using a Linux-based system for many general tasks. Certain niches vary in usability on Linux, especially if the niche is cemented in certain proprietary software. Modern Linux-based systems (both distro and desktop environment) are just more polished than the experience to be had on Windows 10 or Windows 11. Many common frustrations when using Windows (device driver installation, printers, drawing tablets, HDR, system updates, software updates, system maintenance, lack of dark patterns, error message clarity, etc.) are things that a modern Linux system deals with a lot less, to a lesser extent, or just not at all. After spending many years learning both Windows and Linux, Linux systems are just more functional and easier to use.

Much better than Windows 11, the only other choice I had.

I'm just grateful it exists.

From a practical standpoint, when combined with upgradable hardware, it means you can run the same machine for several years, saving money and reducing e-waste. I also believe that FOSS will always provide better long-term solutions than proprietary alternatives.

I'm over twenty years deep. I had a friend who was always my go-to for technical problems with my windows laptop. He ended up becoming a technical support guy for windows shops. anyways, he mentioned Linux one day as I was babbling about file sharing during the Napster days. I went down the rabbit hole from there. I've been called a systems administrator, server administrator, systems engineer, DevOps engineer, etc as job titles. it clicked in my head how or why it worked and it felt liberating. I'm the grumpy guy scowling trying to figure out how your windows or Mac operating systems work like how normal people are trying to figure out how mine works.

While just running better for most of the tasks I do (and being more customizable) are a huge plus. I am also personally sick of the way Microsoft (and most other large corporations) do business. So Linux is my way to do what I can to not support them and move towards a better future.