I would only hazard against Debian for gaming because of it’s slower update cycle (yes yes you could use unstable or sid…), so performance improvements or fixes will take longer to get to you.
Otherwise I completely second your comment; OOP, just pick anything mainstream like Ubuntu, Linux Mint, Bazzite, Pop!_OS, you’ll be fine on any of those. Once you’re comfortable with whatever you chose, then you’ll be more informed on picking a distro more suitable for your liking.
As an experienced Linux user, I just migrated my last windows machine to Debian sid, my gaming PC. And it’s great. But I started on stable, and moved to sid after a few weeks, and it really wasn’t an issue for gaming or general use. My partner’s gaming computer is still on stable.
But yeah for someone less familiar, Bazzite and Mint are great choices. Pop! OS if you like the look of it, or Zorin OS if you like its look. You can always try something new if you’re interested in its features.
I use Fedora after trying Bazzite and Pop-OS. Pop had some quirks I wasn’t a fan of and Bazzite was too locked down but I’ll admit, it worked out of the box with no fuss at all.
I run CachyOS, it works great for me. It’s not the easiest one, but I like the rolling release style and it’s by far the fastest distro I’ve used (cold boots to gnome desktop in maybe 10 seconds).
It’s very popular to the point where multiple other distros are starting to offer its patched kernel on their distro. It’s very focused on gaming performance, particularly around Steam and Proton.
The general consensus is that you shouldn’t be selecting your distro based on gaming, all of the modern well maintained distros will be relatively the same performance. In my opinion you should select your distro first on how well maintained it is, then on stability, & then how well you know how to fix issues. Although I don’t follow my own advice since I use arch but that is because I am far more accostumed to that ecosystem.
I’m dangerously close to moving my gaming pc to Linux. What’s the consensus for the best distro for gaming?
I’m comfortable enough with *nix, as my daily is MacOS and I have a home lab/server.
I use Bazzite. I like it a lot.
As an avid CachyOS user, yes, Bazzite is amazing and every new Linux user (who games) should use it.
There is no “dedicated” one for gaming. Ubuntu Mint, Debian are solid ones. I run Mint MATE personally
I would only hazard against Debian for gaming because of it’s slower update cycle (yes yes you could use unstable or sid…), so performance improvements or fixes will take longer to get to you.
Otherwise I completely second your comment; OOP, just pick anything mainstream like Ubuntu, Linux Mint, Bazzite, Pop!_OS, you’ll be fine on any of those. Once you’re comfortable with whatever you chose, then you’ll be more informed on picking a distro more suitable for your liking.
As an experienced Linux user, I just migrated my last windows machine to Debian sid, my gaming PC. And it’s great. But I started on stable, and moved to sid after a few weeks, and it really wasn’t an issue for gaming or general use. My partner’s gaming computer is still on stable.
But yeah for someone less familiar, Bazzite and Mint are great choices. Pop! OS if you like the look of it, or Zorin OS if you like its look. You can always try something new if you’re interested in its features.
PopOS in my opinion. It (mostly) solves the issue of getting the drivers needed to run GPUs.
I use Fedora after trying Bazzite and Pop-OS. Pop had some quirks I wasn’t a fan of and Bazzite was too locked down but I’ll admit, it worked out of the box with no fuss at all.
Cachyos seems like the general recommendation. Haven’t used it myself, but I’ve used its kernel so I guess that counts for something.
I run CachyOS, it works great for me. It’s not the easiest one, but I like the rolling release style and it’s by far the fastest distro I’ve used (cold boots to gnome desktop in maybe 10 seconds).
I have never heard of Cachyos until this comment.
It’s very popular to the point where multiple other distros are starting to offer its patched kernel on their distro. It’s very focused on gaming performance, particularly around Steam and Proton.
Cachy is the most popular distro on distrowatch. Has been for a month or more. That’s a good place to get the list of current distros.
Bazzite is great!
The general consensus is that you shouldn’t be selecting your distro based on gaming, all of the modern well maintained distros will be relatively the same performance. In my opinion you should select your distro first on how well maintained it is, then on stability, & then how well you know how to fix issues. Although I don’t follow my own advice since I use arch but that is because I am far more accostumed to that ecosystem.
I use Garuda for gaming, but most would likely recommend Bazzite.
I’m running OpenSuse Tumbleweed. Works great.
I’m installing Nobara right now. Will check in.
If you enjoy Nix, then so you know NixOS works just as well for gaming. Been using it for 2 years now.