Former distrohoppers, where did you settle down?

Which one(s)
Arch.
why?
The Arch-Wiki
I like pacman
The Arch-Wiki
I wanted a rolling-release distribution.
The Arch-Wiki
It just works. I had only one more serious problem in ~8 years of running Arch
Did I mention the Arch-Wiki?
Edit:
Having said that, I have an eye on immutable distros. Maybe one day I'll try one out.
- EndeavourOs makes it super simple too
  
  So does archinstall.
- The Arch wiki really is amazing. It's also still very useful for Linux stuff in general. The qemu page has come in handy more than a dozen times.
  
  Yeah, I use Mint and the Arch wiki is still one of my first stops when I have an issue
- Is Manjaro good if I want in on this Arch goodness but don't want to spend hours configuring stuff? Coming from Fedora
  
  I haven't used Manjaro myself but I heard that it is not as good as Arch. Rumors I heard where that it is not as solid as vanilla Arch. YMMV.
  
  Endeavour is better for that, after the install you'll have plain arch but with a bunch of stuff installed and already set up
  
  If you plan to use the AUR, absolutely not.
  If you don't plan to use the AUR it's probably fine, but I haven't used it personally in the last few years so I'm not sure.
  
  I really have bad luck with Manjaro, even when I don't use the aur it always breaks on me. I just stick to arch, I started with it and I'm sticking with it.
  
  I haven’t used it personally but I’ve seen a lot of folks bad mouthing Manjaro.
  Lots of complaints of instability and it being poorly run project. One of the more objective complaints I’ve read is they have a slower release process so security fixes take longer then Arch.
  
  I've been running it on my work laptop for 6 years at this point and I've had no major issues I couldn't solve.
  Having said that, I recently switched my gaming rig over to endeavour and it's been great.
  
  @SubArcticTundra @Haven5341 I personally think Manjaro is a false good idea.
  You'll have an “out of date” system (i.e., one-month-old) but packages from the AUR which are made for the up-to-date system.
  Quite a nightmare to use IMO (and that's not talking about Manjaro leadership and certificates problems)
  
  I've been daily driving Manjaro for 4 years without any issues. Generally speaking I'd recommend seeing if there is a flatpak for an app before using AUR. I don't update as soon as updates are out though, so usually any issues there may have been have been shmoothed over before I get to it.
  
  I've been using manjaro for around a year. It broke on me once, probably my fault, idk. I enjoy it! I've distro hopped many places and a year is a long time for me, so much about it is right for me. You'll certainly get a worthy experience of what arch is capable of, I believe.
  That being said, I plan on swapping to arch really soon.
  
  No. Manjaro is more likely to break than arch because they hold of updating their pakages. What you are looking for is EndavourOS. I consider it to be "the new manjaro"
- you forgot arch wiki

Debian. Seemed like the most generic "Linux" there is. Nothing special, nothing weird. Just Linux. Gray, boring, system defaults Linux.
- It's funny cause it started out as one of the most opinionated Linux distros.
  
  still is, and always has been. and that's not a bad thing.
- And because of that, custom configurations are wonderfully easy to make, technical issues are rare, and the few issues you do experience are quite possible to solve. Which is why I settled on Debian.
- I went from years of using Arch to Debian. I've been tired of the rolling release system and their massive updates. Maybe I was using it wrong but after years my OS was a giant blob with gigabytes of updates every week. I choose Debian for the same reason as you and also because of the stability. If I want the latest version of a package I use Flatpak.
  It just works! Unless there something with Nvidia. Yeah fuck them!
  I miss AUR though

I settled on openSUSE Tumbleweed because it's rolling and reliable. I chose KDE Plasma long before I chose my distro.
- Same. Although I am running Debian on the server.
  
  same!
- Using this right now. It’s been a little less stable then I’ve heard other people claim, I had about a day and half where I was consistently freezing up 5 minutes after login. After that was patched it has been fine.
  The real test for me is if I can walk away from it for 3 weeks and update the system without the world exploding. That was what always broke Arch for me.
  
  I used to use Leap but I switched to the Tumbleweed repos and updated with no issues. It did take a while though.
  
  All my problems have been of my own making. Also I updated one computer after 18 months or thereabouts and it was fine although I wouldn't recommend leaving it that long on a computer you actually use!

I am now at NixOS. I like the reproducibility and immutability of the distro, but the documentation is far from great and configuring the OS you want is not that straightforward. I also don't like that even though it has a great number of packages, they tend to be slightly outdated.
I am not sure if I will stick with it, but I really like that I can create very specialised configurations that are also portable. I am currently using KDE but I am thinking of switching to Hyprland once I get more comfortable around NixOS and home manager/flakes, as nothing beats tiling managers in my opinion.
- After trying out a few distros over the last 20 years or so (~~open~~SUSE, Ubuntu, Debian, Arch, Fedora and Silverblue were the ones I actively used for a stretch of time on desktop, Debian and CentOS on server), I also landed on NixOS.
  Who knows what the future brings, but things feel more settled to me than they ever have. Maybe that's because there's a (declarative) solution for every custom setup, it's just a function of time and profiency in Nix. Or maybe it's because I invested quite a bit of work into a trivially reproducible setup for most of my machines and workflows (all in one glorious version-controlled flake), that the sunk costs are too high to switch elsewhere.
  I'm still willing to experiment with DEs/WMs, currently running Gnome on my main and Sway on weaker machines. Hyprland is a bit out there for my taste, but I'm really looking forward to giving Cosmic DE a try once it's ready.
- I also settled on NixOS after Ubuntu -> Arch -> Debian -> Fedora -> Silverblue -> NixOS. Couldn't be happier and no plans to leave.
- Nixpkgs is actually one of the most up to date software repositories. (~90% according to repology)
  You may be using a release channel which will only be updated for important security updates.
  https://nixos.wiki/wiki/Nix_channels
- NixOS/hyprland is the perfect blend of practicality and fun for me
  It works pretty solidly, sometimes doing something others can do imperatively in a single command can be a pain though
- Did you have to learn the Nix language? I like the idea but I found all the different commands you have to use confusing...
  
  You can get pretty far with copy-pasting. If you want to try it out, you should first realize that there's always 10+ different ways to do the same thing. Stick with what works and with what seems the most intuitive to you.
  Personally, I suggest going straight for a flake-based setup. Flakes are somehow still labeled experimental, but they're actually mature and broadly adopted.
  
  You can start with getfleek.dev and transition to nix after you settled and fleek isnt enough anymore.
- Another vote for Nix!

Fedora.
(Specifically Workstation - i.e. the Gnome variant, but I've used other spins and they're also great)
Pretty up to date, reliable, spearheads new developments that go on to benefit the Linux desktop as a whole, they don't make a bunch of crazy alterations to the DEs they ship.
And to think I was reluctant to try it for ages because the name sounds like it'd be some neckbeardy distro.
- And to think I was reluctant to try it for ages because the name sounds like it'd be some neckbeardy distro.
  When Linus Tech Tips did their month-long Linux challenge, they vetoed a viewer suggestion to use Fedora because they thought it was a "meme distro".
  I use Fedora btw
  
  Why would you ever think it was a meme distro? Red Hat has been around forever.

- I want to settle on Debian Stable, I really do, but I use Hyprland, so I'll have to wait until we get Debian 13 (hopefully 13 and not 14 lol).
  
  Hyprland is surprisingly easy to build/install from source.
- How is Arch “making things difficult for oneself”?
  I set it up once 8 years ago and have since migrated my install across several SSDs.
  Still runs like butter.

Fedora atomic GNOME aka silverblue
It has very good defaults, works out of the box, I can switch anytime to another de or a ublue image without messing around with my setup
selinux
podman
flatpak centric
auto updates
widely used
Current Cons:
openssl is not installed by default (for gsconnect)
gnome-tweaks is not installed by default
uses toolbx instead of distrobox. Toolbx is better for servers, distrobox better for desktop, imo.
flatpak firefox isn't used
- Opensuse micro has distrobox as the default shell. It still needs some work before i daily drive it tho
  
  And it uses firefox flatpak and iirc it installes gnome tweaks by default. Opensuse does right what fedora missed until today.
  But, ostree is incredible. There's no ostree on opensuse and what do I want with btrfs snapshots if I can have ostree's image based approach? I love opensuse for tumbleweed but fedora rocks with ostree. I could switch to a ublue image but I can also just overlay the packages which isn't that bad. It's just bad for newcomers. And no newcomer should have to use ublue because the official image lacks stuff. But it is what it is.

Arch. Minimal, fast, rolling and it doesn't break. Plus, the AUR and the Wiki are unvaluable.
Had been on: RedHat (199something), Mandrake, Slackware, Ubuntu and Debian before.
- I thought Arch was notorious for breaking all the time? Is that a specific version of Arch?
  
  This is a misconception. Arch breaks only if you mess enough with AUR. If you keep with official repo and maybe Flatpaks, you'll be fine
  You can use AUR with moderation as well and you'll still be fine
  
  Dunno, during 8ish years I have only hada couple of minimal problems due to updates (and the solution was promptly available on Arch homepage). Can't speak for other, though.
  
  That’s not my experience - have been using arch for around four years and it broke only once by not letting me log into the system after I failed to update pam configs after the system upgrade.
  
  We're using Arch 2
  (No it doesn't, it just has some bugs here and there, e.g. my media keys don't work after a couple days of uptime (gnome). I stopped actively looking for and reading the release notes years ago as it just works... and if it doesn't, I still have a btrfs snapshot from before the update)
  
  I tried Manjaro for awhile and had some major system breaks. Manjaro is/was often pitched as newbie-friendly arch, so having it break made me think arch was going to be even worse.
  Been running endeavour for a few years now though, and haven't had any real issues. Much smoother than my Manjaro experience.
- Oh I completely forgot about RedHat! Yes, that was my first one too. Then Ubuntu was kinda the thing to go to and it worked for a good while until it just didn't work for me anymore.
  Today I'm on Mint because it was the first distro I tried that was able to get the Wifi working on my super old/bad HP Laptop. I started to like it and then also moved to Mint on my desktop. Running it for a year now and since my PC isn't the youngest anymore, I doubt I will switch distro again anytime soon.
- unvaluable
  You've edited this post and left this in (or added it!?) so I suppose you mean it!
  
  I just made a mistake, sorry :-P English us not my first language.

I learned, and learned, and learned, and every step led me to simplify, simplify, simplify.
Now, I’m a Debian man. If I didn’t install it, it probably isn’t on there, just like I like it.
- Yeah might have gotten stuck on Debian as well if I didn't make the mistake to run stable when I first tried it. Choosing stable made sense to me since I wanted a stable os but when I was greeted by "ICE weasel" that was way behind the Firefox I got used to on Ubuntu and other software being terribly out of date I decided to move on.
  Well then I got stuck on Arch.
  But while it would be easy to say "never looked back" that's not true of course, these days I tun Debian on most of my machines (only that they are servers) and Ubuntu on some (like my work Laptop) my personal Desktop and laptop are Arch though and probably always will be.

Debian. So many other distros are based on it anyway. I use it on damn near everything now.

Debian. It always works until it doesn’t and when it doesn’t there’s information at my level of understanding that allows me to correct it.

I settled on two.
Arch for my desktop, because there I like having an always up-to-date system with the latest drivers and libraries so that I can always try the latest versions of whatever it is I want to play with next. Pacman is also a pretty good package manager, and almost any piece of software that is not in the default repos can be found in the AUR. For the rest, I also like that Arch just gets out of your way and lets you configure your system how you want.
Debian for anything that runs unattended, like all my homelab services. It's well tested, offers feature stability, has long-enough support, and doesn't do weird things every other release like forcing snaps or netplan or cloud-init on you. Those "boring" qualities make it the perfect base to run something for a long time that doesn't scream for attention all the time.

Mint unironically. I've reached a point where I've got a lot of things going on in my life that I don't have the time and just need something that works and I don't need to fiddle around with much.
- This makes me feel better. I had the entire intention to distro hop around but mint was the first one and it just worked lol
  
  I always come running back to Mint because it Just Works.

EndeavourOS.
I'm naturally a tinkerer and an avid gamer, with very recent hardware so an Arch based distro fits really nice.
It has just the right amount of pre-installed stuff. Not quite as bloaty as Manjaro or most ubuntu-based distros, but not quite as DIY as vanilla Arch. I know I can install and uninstall anything on Linux but when a distro already comes with just the right baseline for me, work smarter, not harder.
Ubuntu/Debian based distros didn't quite suit me, I love the AUR to death, I love the Arch wiki (even if a lot of it can be used just fine on other distros), I love rolling release and having the latest everything. I do use PopOS on my laptop since I use it a lot less and therefore I want to update it less often.
Only issue is when they ship dumb defaults sometimes that break my workflow but I can diagnose and undo them I guess.
- Was on Fedora for 3 yrs now and decided to distrohop to EndeavourOS like yesterday. Reason: jc141 releases were finnicky on Fedora; very very probably my fault lol.
  Gotta say, I'm impressed with the system and makepkg is just so comfy to use wtf.
  Might go back to Fedora eventually but EndeavourOS has been a smooth sailing so far. I think I'll stay a while.
- Right there with ya. EndeavourOS has been my distro for at least two years now. There really isn't a reason to hop.
  Also, if I need to reinstall for whatever reason (happens semi regularly because I'm a moron who moves fast and breaks shit), I just drop my package list from my home partition into the live-boot directory and it'll download all my applications during install, and I'm back to where I was in less than half an hour.
  Also the extras included like the update application, and mirror refresh, are very convenient.

Debian: stability
- Same! Distrohopped for years, but for ~15 years Debian has been rock solid for both desktop and home minimal server.
- Same. After 20 years of distro hopping and living on latest releases, Debian feels like home with the least amount of broken packages and general overall panic.

Servers are a different story but for Desktop, OpenSUSE.
Because:
It's stable even on their rolling OS (Tumbleweed)
Gaming works exceptionally well
CUDA works with little effort
RPM-based (personal preference)
zypper is an excellent package manager and my experience has been better than that of yum/dnf
Extensive native packages and 3rd party repos
No covert advertising in the OS
Minimal (no?) Telemetry
Easy to bind to active directory
it feels polished and well built
I do not have to mess with it to make it work
Part of my transition from Windows to Linux was that basic tasks like installing software or even the OS itself shouldn't be a high effort endeavour. I should be able to point to a package file or run a package manager and be able to go about my day without running "make" and working my way through dependency hell.
I say this as a Linux user of all different flavours for well over 15 years who has a deep love for what it brings to the table. If we want it to be common place with non-IT folks, it needs to work and it needs to be simple to use.
- I liked LEAP when I tried it a couple of years back. They're getting rid of it soon, and I don't really like rolling releases so probably won't try anything SUSE any time soon.

Arch btw
- Same, though I'm (sorta) not using it now, and I don't know that I could've been considered a hopper.
  I started with Ubuntu then gave Gentoo a shot. Got tired of the maintenance and went with LMDE. Switched back to Windows when I switched my gaming from console to PC.
  A few years ago I read about Proton and decided to check my Steam library against ProtonDB. All the games I still played (and most that I had stopped) were rated gold or higher. At that point I was done with Windows, at least for machines I own, and gave Arch a shot.
  I stuck with that until my power supply died and will be going back to it once I can afford to build a good PC. For now I'm just using my Steam Deck and hooking it up to a dock when I'm at my desk. It runs SteamOS which is Arch-based but a different experience for sure. I can still use Pacman and the AUR, but with some hefty caveats that almost make it not worth it.

Linux Mint: Debian Edition. Love mint's cinnamon DE, and the plus of being away from Canonical's shenanigans is great. It's been stable and my daily driver for months now.
- I'm right with you. I started with Ubuntu Feisty Fawn in 2007, and I've tried a bunch of distros since then. Mint requires the least amount of fussing with out of the box for standard functionality. I've also recently moved to the Debian Edition and very happily. I believe it is the future of Mint.

EndeavourOS. I like the simplicity and minimalism of stock Arch, bloated distros bother me. I have been thinking of trying out Linux Mint again though, I used it for years and it was really good.
- This is precisely where I am at. Endeavor for when I need a newer kernel and Mint for when I want something that just dang works without too much config and driver work. I suggest Mint to friends but love having AUR and yay.
  
  The just dang works part of Mint is so nice. I do like learning and tinkering, but I have to say setting up my printer in endeavourOS was brutal! I had all the right software installed, but it ended up needing a single line of code pasted in to a file I never would have guessed on my own. I'll paste the info here on the slight chance it will save anyone else from the trauma I went through 😅
  Reference article: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Avahi
  2.1 Hostname resolution
  Avahi provides local hostname resolution using a "hostname.local" naming scheme. To enable it, install the nss-mdns package and start/enable avahi-daemon.service. use sudo instead of doas if that's the tool you prefer.
  doas systemctl start avahi-daemon.service
  Then, edit the file /etc/nsswitch.conf and change the hosts line to include mdns_minimal [NOTFOUND=return] before resolve and dns. It should look like:
  
  hosts: mymachines mdns_minimal [NOTFOUND=return] resolve [!UNAVAIL=return] files myhostname dns
- EndeavourOS is way too opinionated on i3 for my liking, and the theme is not great. Still it is very stable and offers a reasonable out of the box arch experience.
  
  Do they customize it too heavily away from its defaults? I use KDE so I don't bump in to that issue myself.

Debian, settled down few years ago and my fallback would be Fedora.
Nice thing about Debian is, I can use it for servers, desktop and raspberry pi on am64, arm7 and aarch64. This is a real killer feature for me, because I'd rather do interesting things with my devices instead of learning n different ways to accomplish the same tasks. (e.g. using different distributions for server/desktop/pi and having to figure out 3 times the names of the same packages or where the configuration file in which version is expected.)

A mixture of NixOS and Debian, depending on the machine. NixOS is trivial to maintain and to keep predictable and tidy. When its weirdness is a problem, Debian is my answer. It doesn't get more normal than Debian.

Fedora, it just works. I've considered going back to Arch for the AUR several times, but I just don't want to deal with it at this point
- Distrobox is a god send tool for using AUR stuff in any distro.
- EndeavourOS is good for having arch, without having to deal with having arch

Up until last year I would have said Ubuntu. It was qualitatively the best desktop choice when I started with it in the aughts, and is still one of the few distros that has a reasonable out of the box install option with LVM. But I recently tried a Silverblue variant and NixOS, and I like what I see. Once I'm comfortable enough I will switch, I'm tired of the ensnapification and the Pro nag screens.
- Ensnapification is hilarious lmao

Debian, because it is boring, predictable, and I know how to tweak it to suit my use case
- same

Ubuntu -> Pop!_OS -> EndeavorOS

Either Debian or Fedora + flatpak & KDE. I'm familiar with both and they just work for me. Distrohopping and messing around with my computer feels like a chore more than anything else these days.

Linux Mint, I wanted Manjaro with KDE to work so much. But the issue I had with it, and no not the in general complaints about Manjaro, was how annoying it is to set up again. Rebuilding a machine or an install was just such a hassle, that I wanted to move to a Ubuntu/Debain based distro, where everything was already made for it.
If my current build of Linux Mint dies, then I'd probably move to the Mint DE and remove the Ubuntu part.
Troubleshooting is easier, finding apps is easier, and outside of advance user packages like MangoHud and XPadNeo where I needed to build from source (not fun). It's been a painless experience.

I think GNU Guix System scratches all my itches:
Committed to being 100% free software even at the kernel level (I know this is controversial)
Focus on reproducible builds
Atomic updates that can be rolled back if something breaks
A package manager that makes it relatively easy to package software (there are importer commands that can import from language-specific package managers such as pip and cargo) and makes it possible, as a user, to apply transforms to packages (i.e. build with X commit or with Y patch)
Per-user profiles (in addition to the root profile and the system profile) allowing user to install software without requiring root. Users can even create separate profiles as well as throwaway profiles for running scripts or one-off commands (i.e. a python or bash script can use guix shell as its interpreter listing all the packages it requires).
Previously I used Ubuntu from 2008 to 2009, Trisquel from 2009 to 2014, and Debian from 2014 to 2019.
- Though I have yet to try Guix, I think I'd move over to it if they adopted something similar to flake support. The idea that it uses a non-arbitrary language for declaration is very appealing to me. Do you know if it's simple enough to get non-free kernels, though?

Mac OS.
Debian for my servers though.

Settled on Linux Mint Debian Edition.
I just want reliability, a beautiful desktop and great support. Plus 100% community based - Debian + Cinnamon.
No corps like canonical or red hat and no heavy maintenance routine like Arch.

Stopped hopping when I realized most distros are just debian with certain things pre-installed or pre-configured. Decided to compare base distros, and settled on Gentoo for its powerful features, transparency and customizability.

I switched to guix and haven't looked back.
Mostly because:
I like the idea of functional package managers
I like guix's dedication to making every package buildable from source (thus the no non-libre code rule)
I like the expressiveness of scheme vs Nix's package description language
Guix is the smoothest time I've ever built packages for a distro before (well outside arch). Which is good because there's a lot of out of date and unadded packages for potential.
- there's a lot of out of date and unadded packages for potential.
  The main reason why I'm running nix over guix. I need it to freshen up Debian packages, and it's giving me even older ones.
  The close runner up was horrible prebuilt bin coverage(a year or two ago). I had to separate browsers into a manifest of their own, because Firefox didn't get a prebuilt even days after the update. It's not fun having to leave your browser compiling over night with 100% CPU fans as a lullaby.

Mint. Because apparently "task bar and start menu that looks like gnome 2 and/or xp" is heresy in modern ui design (although maybe kde would also work? Had some papercuts that put me off it last I tried though).
Also, it turns out that getting a full time job really kills your desire to tinker and mess around with your personal system. I just want something that works.
- Because apparently "task bar and start menu that looks like gnome 2 and/or xp" is heresy in modern ui design
  You get that with pretty much any DE. I think KDE even let's you choose between xp and 11 style of start menus, but I can't remember windows details. I've even seen GNOME configured that way in the previous version of nobara, but I'm guessing that would take a while.

Like everyone i started on Windows.
From there -> Mint -> Ubuntu 16 -> Fedora -> Ubuntu 18 -> elementary -> Ubuntu 18 (again) -> Ubuntu 22 -> EndeavourOS
I've god damn I love EndeavourOS. Now just hop between the supported DEs instead :)

Debian. I've been using Linux since 1999, and I've tried everything under the sun. Back then, I was a Red Hat person, then an ubuntu person mostly, but Debian is where there's stability that doesn't mess with your mental health. It just works, and that has more value than being pretty or having the latest bells and whistles.

OpenSuse (back then the "normal" one, then Leap and now the rolling release Tumbleweed). It just works really well and keeps on trucking. Updated my old machine for ten years through all the openSuse releases without reinstalling. The repositories are very well kept in order and the build service easily provides anything I might find lacking.
Also, I quite like using Yast for system administration. There are many areas that I rarely touch and having a GUI available is super helpful.

Age. I'm old now.
I do it once in a while, to feel young, but not benefit all that much. (Having said that about my daily desktop, I do have multiple machines and VMs that run all sorts of distros)

openSUSE Tumbleweed, because real life got a little too much and I wanted something that just worked.

My journey was:
Mandrake/Mandriva
Debian (v2.4)
Ubuntu (v6.04)
Debian (8)
Arch Linux
NixOS
I left Debian for Ubuntu when it simply worked better and left Ubuntu when it became too restrictive and weird. I need a working system but my freedom to experiment. Then I discovered arch and never looked back. Still kept Debian on servers.
Currently using arch on desktop machines and nixos on my servers. But I use nix for Dev environments and dotfiles even on arch.
Not sure if I'll stay with NixOS but for now that seems like the direction I'm going to. Still love Arch Linux for it's freedom though, but I'm getting older and don't have the time to fiddle with everything.

GNU Guix
peak hackability while also having binary downloads
- I do love it, I just wish it was easier to update package recipes. I have open patches since over a year.
- @urfavlaura @tet @RikerGoogling
- Why not nix?
  I ask because I've been thinking of trying Guix or Nix. I lean more towards nix due to popularity but also because theoretically a language tailored for package recipes may do better than guille.
  
  Nix syntax is just... strange, and undiscoverable to me. Coming from a emacs/lisp background, Scheme was just easy to understand, and there was no ambiguity in contructing grammars out of thin air.
  
  They are way different, different licences, different language, different init by default.
  I like guile and shepherd much better than nix and systemd.

I think I'll settle down with Void + XFCE

Windows

Ubuntu-kubuntu-mint-debian-manjaro-opensuse tumbleweed-Fedora. Been on fedora for a few years, anytime I try something different I come right back. I want to like openSuse but I ways seem to have some weird ass issues with it

I've only hopped from Ubuntu to Arch. I'm currently messing with debian in a vm.
Staying on Arch because I love pacman+paru
- AUR is also amazing
  
  Using pacman is basically using the AUR. I should've clarified that I love the AUR because you can search for any packages you want in your terminal in paru. It's so convenient and amazing. In ubuntu you gotta search up what ppa repo it is or succumb to using flatpak.
  
  I have to say I dont get the AUR I have been using Debian for the past 20 years and have tried Arch based out on my steam deck and in Distrobox on my sid gaming PC and I just don't get it.
  I hear all these great things about the AUR but when I tried it. It didn't seem to be that much easier than building a Deb pkg or doing a make install from source. the way I hear people talk about it I figured it was just like installing from a source Repo on Debian.
  please note I'm not saying anything bad about Arch I personally love the arch wiki it's great to even fix things in Debian. I just personally don't get it. maybe I'm not using it right or distobox does not give me the full experience. Any idea what I'm doing wrong?

Arch, cause it has everything I needs + I don't have to reinstall between big updates (Arch is Rolling release)

Gentoo.
Everything just works and I can configure everything the way I want.

Thought I settled down with EndeavourOS.. then I got into ricing and the urge to move to void or alpine is strong

Ubuntu.
I jumped from Ubuntu to Fedora to Netrunner to Arch to Gentoo to Mint then back to Ubuntu.
Did I regret it? Nah, I learned alot with my adventure but these days I just prefer the common distro denominator. Although to be fair my Ubuntu isn't exactly a vanilla Ubuntu as I did add some changes I see fit.

Pop!_OS. I previously got stuck on tiling window managers, but I found that they have prohibitively large amounts of setup involved. It's also not uncommon for support applications to be poorly maintained or to have a poor UX. Pop!_OS's desktop gathers everything together very nicely into a working shell with minimal setup, but still has that sweet, sweet tiling WM.
- This kind of setup works best for me, a desktop environment with a tiling window manager on the top, that way I can use it like a normal desktop for most things and can hop back and forth between apps I use a lot all on the home row with the window manager.
  
  Yeah, I've really liked the flexibility it gives me while leaving behind hassle. Before I had tried XMonad and AwesomeWM with various tray apps for things like wireless networking. I enjoyed using them, but I did not enjoy the amount of work I put into set up. Sure I like tinkering, but there's a certain level where I just want to have a dependable, working system so I can get on with my day.

Bookworm

I've been using Ubuntu since 12.04 LTS, and old habits die hard. There have been many attempts by my peers to steer me toward Arch and NixOS, but Ubuntu suits my needs and I am used to it after a decade

Arch ecause of the large amount of software available on the AUR.
I set it up with SwayFX, Alacritty Firefox & Sway Lock. Slap your favourite text editor on there and you've everything you need.

Arch for my PC and laptop, Debian for all my servers, VMs, LXCs, etc.

Ubuntu -> Fedora -> Debian stable (and lots of flatpaks) for my desktop. Ubuntu has only gotten worse with age, and I got tired of being on the leading edge and just want stuff to work (and I use ZFS so I don't want rapidly upgrading kernels). For my home server Ubuntu -> Centos -> Almalinux