I’ve seen people suggest Ubuntu without mentioning Kubuntu, but it seems like most people (especially gamers?) prefer KDE Plasma. I’ve seen people complain about Ubuntu’s GUI and lack of customization, but then no one suggests them to try Kubuntu instead. It seems like people just don’t know that Kubuntu exists.
Also as an aside, people often criticize how slow updates are on Ubuntu/Kubuntu/etc, but if you enable the backports ppa then it’s actually pretty quick!
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:kubuntu-ppa/backports
I came from SuSE, which defaults to KDE, so KUbuntu is my distro of choice.
Fun fact: this week, a coworker saw my laptop screen and asked: Is that Windows 11? :-)
I loathe gnome, so whenever I recommend “Ubuntu” I always specify Kubuntu for that reason.
The average joe has no idea what “desktop environment” means and will not understand how you can just swap DE’s even. So starting them off with Kubuntu specifically is ideal IMO.
Ubuntu is fine for grandma, or even Mint, but someone born in the last 40 years will probably appreciate Plasma more.
If you’re really wanting to use “Ubuntu” but don’t want any of the standard options then PopOS is fine from my experience.
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I think most people just say Ubuntu to indicate the Ubuntu family of distros. A help guide for vanilla Ubuntu running GNOME should work the same way for Kubuntu with very minor changes i.e. adding a repository for the GNOME software manager vs the KDE software manager.
ubuntu was the popular stable default
now it’s Bazzite
Except if the gui mentions anything in regards to GUI. Ubuntu and Kubuntu’s system settings aren’t even remotely similar.
That sadly makes Kubuntu a bit of a tough sell for a beginner who wants to primarily use the GUI route, since there’s a guide for Ubuntu for almost everything but not for Kubuntu.
(Which sucks, because I like KDE way more. I of course use KDE, but that makes it kinda hard to recommend Kubuntu to a total beginner.)
There are plenty of other distros that use KDE and are easy to use. Bazzite, for example, is almost too easy.
Yes, but if there’s a guide on how to use some software with a Linux distro, there’s always a guide for Ubuntu and often nothing else. I can’t remember if I have ever seen a guide for 3rd party software for Brazzite.
That’s ok for someone who either does nothing or is advanced enough to adapt the guide to their OS, but for anyone between these extremes it’s a major downside.
Because there’s Mint when you don’t want to talk about Ubuntu.
How up to date is Mint compared to Kubuntu? I feel like I’ve seen complaints about issues with gaming on Mint’s old kernel, but Kubuntu 25.10 seems to have a pretty recent kernel
I have backports enabled so my kernel is on 6.17.0-8
No snaps.
I think Ubuntu (and consequently some of its derivatives) gets a bad rep for some of their proprietary stuff like Snap packages. I have no clue about Kubuntu though, other than that it’s flavored Ubuntu.
I’d wager many users here prefer other distros, and because there are so many to choose from, Kubuntu doesn’t get mentioned.
Ubuntu gets a bad rap on the snap stuff because its kinda hard to ignore, for example of you do an apt-get install firefox it overrides your apt install command to install the snap version instead, which has its own implications with extension access, etc.
Same gripes exist there, the only difference between vanilla Ubuntu & Kubuntu is the DE (AFAIK)
I added Flathub to my Discover and now I don’t have to use Snap lol.
Yea it’s a less common recommendation. But I still think we should be talking about Kubuntu more than Ubuntu so I thought it was weird that I see Ubuntu mentioned a lot but Kubuntu is rarely mentioned.
Desktops can be installed on any ubuntu release. you could install xfce on kubuntu, or kde on base ubuntu. And what DE/WM you are using doesn’t matter in a quite a few scenarios, so it’s not worth bringing up in the same way that I don’t mention “Im using cachyOS niri wm”
I personally preferred xubuntu over kubuntu back in my *ubuntu days. etc etc. there are a lot of spins of ubuntu and when the only differentiator is DE (which you can also just install on base ubuntu), it’s easier to just talk about them all as a single overaching entity/family … ubuntu.
Talking about kubuntu inherently requires talking about KDE and ubuntu both, so people just skip the KDE discussion.
“Too many distro options” is already a complaint of a lot of non-linux users, so specifying every last spin can just drive people away.
“Too many distro options” is already a complaint of a lot of non-linux users, so specifying every last spin can just drive people away.
Yeah but I’m saying Kubuntu should take the lead over Ubuntu.
I actually installed KDE on Ubuntu once, it’s kind of a pain, switching users without logging out doesn’t work.
Discussions that I’ve seen (not here necessarily but in general) seem to bring up Kubuntu as a light weight option for systems that can’t handle the more “bloated” vanilla Ubuntu. And it’s why I put it on an old MacBook I had, because other mainstream Linux flavors were a bit much - no, I didn’t try Arch, I’m also still a beginner technically. Kubuntu works great without overloading it. Doesn’t mean you can’t use it on a more powerful system of course.
My only regret with using Ubuntu for my main is some issues I’ve run into with Snap, but I’m learning how to figure that out and find alternatives like Flakpak, Apt, or using an AppImage when it fails me or seems broken. The lack of updated versions has been the biggest problem. Other than that, the OS itself has been running great. I did have to go with 22.04 because 24.04 just refused to install correctly, had 22.04 also given me problems I probably would be with a different distro.
I assume when people say something like Ubuntu or Fedora then they mean the core of the distro. DE is irrelevant since it’s trivial to change.
Ubuntu’s GNOME is quite different from the vanilla GNOME you’ll find in fedora.
but new users might not know this, especially since it’s under a different name, they might not even think to look and just dismiss it because they don’t like how the screenshots (of GNOME) look
Hmm, I added the PPA to the latest ubuntu LTS, ran apt update, but it doesn’t propose me to actually update anything? Do I need to separately tell it to install plasma from this PPA? Or do I need to install plasma6, because ubuntu LTS is still on plasma 5?
You might need to upgrade out of LTS into 25.10 before the backports will work, or wait until 26.04
*buntu are mainly beginner distros. They work fine out of the box, but many long-term users don’t like them for ideological reasons.
The main advantage of Ubuntu over any other distro is that everything as an Ubuntu guide. The same is not true for Kubuntu, and if you stay in GUI, Ubuntu and Kubuntu share almost no similarities. The settings, the pre-installed default apps, all that differs greatly.
Thus the main reason for using *butnu is gone when using anything else than Ubuntu.
Which kinda sucks, because I like KDE much more.
*buntu are mainly beginner distros.
They aren’t. Canonical enshittifies Ubuntu and the official flavors more and more. The hoops one needs to jump through (like OP’s PPA command because Canonical forbids proper updates) are not user friendly.
Steam Survey shows how Ubuntu’s relevance for home users continues to shrink and alternatives like Bazzite continue to grow.
These hoops don’t matter for beginners. They are usually fine with what Ubuntu provides, or more to the point, don’t even know what they might be missing.
Steam Survey is quite skewed by only showing what gamers use. That’s quite a hefty selection bias, and of course it shows that gamers prefer the Steam Deck and gaming distros.
These hoops don’t matter for beginners. They are usually fine with what Ubuntu provides, or more to the point, don’t even know what they might be missing.
This is /c/linux_gaming. Recommending a distribution with outdated Mesa drivers is not in their interest, whether they know what they’re missing out or not. That’s among several reasons why Ubuntu in general is not a good recommendation for gamers.
Fair point about /c/linux_gaming. OPs question wasn’t really about gaming though and it was specifically about ubuntu/kubuntu.
So if anything, the OP should not have been in /c/linux_gaming, but the answers are on topic.
But even in regards to gaming, Mesa drivers are stable enough nowadays that even a bit outdated ones don’t make a lot of tangible difference unless you are hunting for every last frame. In which case a beginner’s distro isn’t for you anyway.
The average casual gamer will have no issues with Ubuntu.
The average casual gamer will have no issues with Ubuntu.
Average casual gamer will have even fewer than “no” issues with Bazzite. There is no reason why (K)Ubuntu is preferable these days.
Apart from if they are going to use their PC for anything else than gaming.
Except UwUbuntu. We don’t speak of that thing here, or anywhere.
Edit: that was a bad joke, but it seems something like it (UwUntu) does exist! https://uwuntuos.site/
My people
I think Kubuntu is fine for beginners. Nvidia support is good, everything runs on it, and it’s got a stable release cycle
The distro itself is fine for beginners. But the main advantage of Ubuntu over e.g. Linux Mint or Brazzite or any of the other beginner distros is that if e.g. third-party software has a guide on how to use it on Linux it’s almost always about Ubuntu. That is the real advantage of Ubuntu. Kubuntu doesn’t have that.
It’s a homograph, dude. You pick the flavor that has the DE you like. If they mean something specific, they specify.
I’m guilty of saying Ubuntu when I mean Kubuntu. Gnome became stupidly minimalistic by following Apple’s philosophy , I prefer KDE’s customization and the old-school feeling of choice it gives you.
Kubuntu used to be very buggy before, but nowadays the LTS release is very stable.
I think it is because in Ubuntu, Gnome is more common than KDE. It just seems that KDE people are more vocal in their opinions.
Isn’t Kubuntu just the KDE UI on top of Ubuntu, I would imagine limiting conversions to operating systems made things or sysynced.
KDE is more than just a ui, its the set of preinstalled applications that plays a huge role. Kubuntu and Ubuntu feels like two different operating systems.
Yeah but I’m thinking Kubuntu should overtake Ubuntu as the primary for discussion purposes
It’s just generally the more appropriate choice over Ubuntu for most people
Kubuntu is part of Ubuntu. I don’t see why it would need to be mentioned separately that badly.
Because if you’re talking to a beginner they’re going to copy paste the name and download that
which is why people should also say “Fedora KDE” if they think KDE is best, don’t just say “Fedora”
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:kubuntu-ppa/backports
Fiddle with the Terminal to add a PPA (and also Flatpak) just screams usability.
You can add Flathub in Discover without using terminal
Backports aren’t necessary, but it’s nice to have the option if you later decide you want something newer
You can add Flathub in Discover without using terminal
Still not user friendly. Bazzite (and others) has this out of the box.
First enable Flatpak, then add the Flathub repository, and then add a few PPAs here and there just is not user friendly at all, Terminal or not. This is the Linux Gaming community. The likelihood that people here want the emulators that get published on Flathub because of Steam Deck is high.
Backports aren’t necessary, but it’s nice to have the option if you later decide you want something newer
They are necessary because of Canonical’s insane demands for version number freezes. Unpaid volunteers often don’t have the resources to cherry pick and backport individual bug fixes. When the Kubuntu maintainers were blogging more frequently, “add our PPA to get bugfix xyz” was a recurring line.
I don’t have an Ubuntu machine at hand but I’m almost 100 % sure (because I used it in the past) that you can manage repositories via GUI and activate backports by simply activating a checkbox.
Very slightly less of a usability nightmare, especially for beginners who cannot be expected to know this stuff, especially when actually user friendly distributions take these troubles off the user’s hands.
