Linux for me in 2026

The motivation

This year my PC has largely been a gaming system and has lived next to the TV. I've been using my M1 MacBook Air for all development and other tasks.

First motivation: It's quite a powerful custom build, and I'd like to use it more. Being a mini-ITX build it is straightforward to move between desk and TV. It will primarily live at the desk, however.

Secondary motivation: I've been doing more game development lately. This PC has more storage and resources available to it than my MacBook does.

If I'm to use the system more often, I want to be comfortable with the OS and confident the system will be there for me and enable me to do the things I want to do.

This is where some "Microsoft challenges" appear.

AI is being forced into everything - I don't want it

Things in tech are moving quicker than ever these days, especially with regard to all things AI. It seems like all the big companies are integrating and pushing it in some way.

Microsoft is one such example. Perhaps it's limited to the online circles and demographics I hang around in, but I can't recall the last time I've seen a community push back this hard on something a company continues to proceed with.

Many of Microsoft's products are becoming a low-barrier pathway to Copilot, even at the cost of reducing the product's usability and user's pre-existing desire paths and familiarity. Microsoft 365 Copilot (ex Microsoft 365 ex Office ex Microsoft Office) is a prime example.

Consumer products/software aside, perhaps the biggest push is with Windows itself.

Windows is evolving into an agentic OS, connecting devices, cloud, and AI to unlock intelligent productivity and secure work anywhere.

• Pavan Davuluri

"Ask Copilot" is being integrated into the Taskbar. They'd love it to become a natural part of how you use your PC, and perhaps even replace how you use Windows Search (which was already not that great to use in my experience).

As of this year, Notepad provides the means to log into your MS account. It also has the Copilot menu to help you write, summarise, change tone/format. So much for a minimal text editor...

MS Paint is getting AI features to turn images into animations and edit your images via prompting. File Explorer is getting AI features too.

Copilot and AI features are being shoved into everything Microsoft.

But I'm getting side-tracked... There's more to this switch than Microsoft adding AI to everything.

Trust and stability

The quality and rollout of Windows updates have deteriorated quite a bit in the last year or so. (Are they vibe coding it all now?)

Here are some brief examples which did the rounds while I was away on holidays in the last 3-4 weeks:

• Open and close Task Manager - instead of terminating the Task Manager process, it spawns a new one, consuming more resources
• A mandatory security update broke Windows Recovery - keyboard and mouse were not usable, meaning recovery was not possible
• A mandatory security update broke localhost connections, preventing app/web development and preventing dev tools from working
• An update broke the Windows 10 to 11 upgrade path for the Media Creation Tool
• "Update and Shut Down" wouldn't shut down, it would reboot the system
• An update triggered BitLocker recovery - if you don't have your key, you could lose all your data

People may not use Task Manager often, but those recovery/BitLocker issues could have serious ramifications.

Strong erosion of trust going on here for many people.

The switch

Choosing a distro

I've been very interested in the Linux-based (Arch) SteamOS the last few months. Valve are working some absolute magic with Steam+Proton, and their contributions to the Linux and OSS software is impressive.

There are ways to try SteamOS on a PC now, however, it's not officially ready for that and requires some finessing. If I am using the system for gaming and work, and other tasks, I need something which is currently stable and ready to go.

I looked into several distros:

• Ubuntu
• Kubuntu (a flavour of Ubuntu)
• Arch
• Bazzite (Fedora-based)
• CachyOS (Arch-based)

They all have their pros and cons.

Bazzite and CachyOS are immutable, which is a nice thing for those who don't want to get too into the weeds. They are heavily focused and configured for gaming, which is also a great thing, though after pondering, I wanted something a bit more desktop-oriented.

Arch is great - I've used it as a daily driver in the past, though I recall it being fairly hands-on to set some things up and troubleshoot issues. I just want to get going.

Ubuntu is a very popular Debian-based distro and has most bumps smoothed out for most users. Gnome is great; however, their UI direction these days doesn't quite fit with my workflows and how I like to interact with a system, so...

Kubuntu!

Kubuntu is effectively Ubuntu, but instead of the Gnome desktop environment and related software, it comes with KDE instead.

Installation

Installation was fast, straightforward, and just worked. Thanks to modern hardware and how Linux distros deal with multiple bootable drives, setting up dual boot (in case I still need Windows) was trivial.

I had zero issues with any drivers or devices. Historically, I've always had trouble with wifi and bluetooth, and often had issues with GPU drivers too. This time everything just worked - excellent!

Even my external audio device (a Focusrite 2i2) just worked. No drivers, no installation steps, just plug and play.

Crucially, I was never once asked to log into some remote service or platform account to install or use the OS. The system is mine and is not tied to some external company and cloud data.

Following base installation I removed some pre-installed software I'm unlikely to use, installed Steam, installed Chrome, installed IDEs, installed the Unity game engine, and a few other bits and pieces.

Similar to macOS (perhaps even more so), most CLI tools and processes were already available and ready to go.

Impressions

Boot and performance

It's fast. Even considering the strong specs of the PC, it is faster than I expected, both in terms of boot and running games/apps/software.

I can power on, boot, login, and open a game dev project in Jetbrains Rider quicker than it takes my MacBook to go from the login screen to desktop. Yes, it's a fresh build, and it'll slow down in time, but I was still impressed!

KDE desktop environment

It's been really nice to come back to something which feels straightforward and no-frills. There's a "start menu", there's a system tray, windowing feels natural, nothing feels simplified or dumbed down when it comes to configuration and settings.

It's quite hard to put it into words, but it somehow feels like it respects me more as a user of the system compared to Windows or macOS. Things aren't hidden away, it shows and exposes everything it needs to through logical menus and groupings.

Steam and gaming

Steam deserves its own little section.

Linux is famous for not being gamer-friendly. Developers understandably build and release their games for Windows. Even macOS doesn't get much of a look-in.

There was always Wine if you wanted to run Windows software in Linux, but this had varying levels of success with desktop software, let alone games which can demand more from a system's hardware.

In 2018 Valve announced Proton. Proton is forked from Wine, and is included as part of Steam when running on Linux (SteamOS or otherwise). It is a crucial part of the Steam Deck's ability to run games.

Having not tried gaming under Linux for many years, I was amazed at how well everything worked.

After installing Steam, I added the library of games I already had installed on an NTFS drive via Windows.

With one exception, all games I've tried so far have worked without issue, and (anecdotally) with better performance and stability than under Windows.

So far I've tried:

• Dark Souls 1 & 2
• Cyberpunk 2077
• DOOM + DOOM II
• DOOM Eternal
• Downwell
• Elden Ring
• Inscryption
• Lies of P
• Noita
• Starfield
• Trepang2
• Thief: The Dark Project (from GOG, was not installed through Steam)

The only game which had issues was Dark Souls 1, but this one required some trickery/hacks/DSFix to get it to even work properly on Windows.

My TV is only 1080p, my screen is 2k. Even accounting for running at a higher resolution, I've found raytracing and general game performance to feel faster and seem more stable.

It's wild to me that I can run games made for Windows, on Linux, at same/better performance.

Valve is doing amazing work with Proton.

Wrapping up

2026 may just be "the year of Linux".

Getting Kubuntu going was straightforward and problem-free. Things I historically had a lot of grief with, or were not possible, now seem to just work. And in some cases work better than on other platforms.

Perhaps the most telling thing was a sense of "now what?" after setting things up. No more config, no more setup, no more troubleshooting.

Might as well get to work or play some games!