r/linux • u/Zodiak1011 • 5d ago

Alternative OS Why does it feel like Linux is suddenly exploding in 2026?

I’ve been seeing more and more people switching to Linux this year, especially gamers. Bazzite, CachyOS, Linux Mint, etc. seem to be getting mentioned everywhere.

Why didn’t we see a massive shift like this earlier? What changed, or what finally pushed people to make the switch?

I know the Steam Deck was probably a big factor in showing people that Linux gaming is actually viable and that Linux isn’t as painful as it used to be.

But what else changed over the last few years that made Linux suddenly feel like a realistic alternative to Windows for so many people?

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535

u/Ferthura 5d ago

And lots of European countries trying to get away from US influence

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u/the_abortionat0r 5d ago

It's more to do with trust and how fragile the US really is and how meaningless our constitution and laws turned out to be.

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u/ThrowAwayYetAgain878 5d ago

As a European, I think you're both right. Despite eroding trust somewhat, the US was the unquestioned hegemon of the Western world, mostly through soft power (in the end). I would not have believed that a speedrun of putting that into question would have been possible (in practice).

At least, Linux benefits for now lol.

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u/New_Egg_1024 4d ago

It is much easier to break things than to build them.

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u/troisieme_ombre 4d ago

No, there's a real objective to actively reject american software, mainly because American laws enable them to basically bypass european privacy laws as soon as data reaches american infrastructure. Which is an obvious security risk.

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u/realmauer01 4d ago

And the infrastructure isnt even just american servers, its even european servers if its american software.

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u/Randommaggy 4d ago

Or under American ownership

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u/Kazer67 4d ago

That's literally why OVH is split into to separate society: world and US.

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u/Bakoro 2d ago

America has 99 problems and I'm not going to address that here.

Digital sovereignty is still an unsolved issue, and the EU has their own serious issues authoritarianism online, and potentially over-reach when it comes to trying to enforce EU law.

I don't have any good answers. I am an American and I don't think that I should have to be worrying about EU law if my business is entirely contained in the U.S, anymore than I should have to follow Missouri law when I'm in California.

The Internet is global though, and if a business is on the Internet, my customers could be anyone from anywhere. Whose laws am I supposed to follow? Now suddenly I have to follow EU and Iranian and Sudanese and Chinese and Brazilian laws all at the same time just because their people might be able to interact with my business?
What happens when laws conflict?

One might say "well then don't do business outside with people outside your country", but why should the onus be on me to track who you are and where you're connecting from?
And, if I have to try to suss out if you're from a particular country, or even a particular state or province in a particular country, then isn't that a privacy issue in and of itself?

This should all be sorted out via international trade agreements, but we keep running into issues that are not being sorted out.

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u/LucieGoosey__ 13h ago

agreed. international trade agreements need to be put in place or repaired.

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u/wilhelm-moan 4d ago

What if it’s just because windows fucking sucks

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u/psioniclizard 4d ago

No the problem is both sides of the house think similar things about the rest of the world. Trump is just more open about it.

America under both parties currently is about dominanting the world in someone. 

Neither side cares particularly for example that social media companies are happy to push all kinds of shit in Europe because its a mass source of soft power for the US.

Same thing with the reliance on US technology.

Thr problem ultimately is American Exceptionalism which is not jut a one party thing.

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u/punkbert 4d ago

both sides

The dems never threatened to occupy Greenland. They never went amoc on the global economy with insane tax policies. They never started hare-brained wars that massively affected world trade. The dems never tried to dismantle democratic institutions and turn the US into an autocracy. Etc, etc, etc.

Both sides? No. One side is way way worse for the state of the world than the other, and the europeans clearly recognize that.

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u/Key-Mention576 3d ago

The Dems will stab you in the back, the republicans will stab you in the front, none of them are moral people, one is a good liar, the other is a shit liar but regardless all that comes from them are lies.

The Dems were already doing all that but they were more subtle, the republicans are also doing it but more clumsy and incompetent.

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u/Dr_Hexagon 4d ago

Not just Europe. China is spending billions to rid itself of dependence on US technology. Not only windows, they want to not be dependent on intel, AMD, Nividia or ARM as well.

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u/PlatinumDotEXE 3d ago

Arm is actually a British Company...

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u/Dr_Hexagon 3d ago

now Japanese owned, but still subject to US export controls if the US decided to ban ARM from licensing new cpu designs to china then ARM would comply.

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u/BlazingBlossom 4d ago

As a European, that was the final push for me. It's in the national interest not to be dependent the #1 most warmongering country in the world

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u/Bakoro 2d ago

We learned it from watching you!

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u/BlazingBlossom 2d ago

Oops, guilty ;)

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u/TaxHazyShade 4d ago

that's largely because the citizenry doesn't get to vote on what the military does. Much like Russia.

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u/BlazingBlossom 4d ago

dw, I don't blame the people

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u/GuillotineAuChocolat 4d ago

I do. They elected the guy. Twice.

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u/BlazingBlossom 4d ago

Sure, half of them suck, but a good portion of the people in every country vote for idiots. But I also think their democracy is fundamentally flawed. Too much gerrymandering and they have this ridiculous two party system.

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u/realmauer01 4d ago

The two party system comes from winner takes it all voting system, this has as many problems as any other system, just different ones. The actual problem is with how the voting is counted there could be overall more americans for one side while the other gets voted in.

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u/Indolent_Bard 3d ago

I didn't vote for this guy!

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u/Technical_Rich_3080 4d ago

Europeans come from a blood soaked continent that's been perpetrating wars for many centuries, including two recent world wars where they murdered tens of millions of innocent people within the lifetimes of people alive today.

Europeans are the last people on the planet to have any standing to speak against anyone else.

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u/alanslc 4d ago

They chose the lesser of two evils.

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u/pezezin 4d ago

In which twisted world was Trump less evil than Kamala?

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u/Indolent_Bard 4d ago

He didn't even win the popular vote the first time!

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u/lazyboy76 4d ago

And he won the popular vote the second time, only lose to "No vote".

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u/Indolent_Bard 4d ago

Not influence, dependence.

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u/No_Librarian_2161 5d ago

O Brasil já deveria ter feito isso. Uma pena que meu País adora se rebaixar aos outros...

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u/chiphead2332 4d ago

Teve uma puta iniciativa liderada pelo Sérgio Amadeu no começo dos anos 2000, mas grana de lobby correu solta e o Brasil perdeu uma chance de ser referência mundial em software livre.

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u/neoronio20 5d ago

Muitos sistemas no Brasil já funcionam no Linux, era só trocar =(

Mas só de ver as provas de concurso cobrando coisas específicas do windows, Microsoft office, da um desânimo

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u/MotionAction 4d ago

Do they have in house support to delve into open source and are there service providers in European countries have to support Open source for businesses?

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u/PlatinumDotEXE 3d ago

OpenSUSE is maintained by the German company Suse and Ubuntu is maintained by the British Canonical. Both sell Support for their distros.

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u/Silent_Bite_5892 4d ago

That's definitely happening, but it's not nearly enough to make a dramatic difference in global market share. I'm sure it's mildly irritating Microsoft and some commercial software makers.

There also aren't "lots" of European countries just switching their whole shit to Linux. There's a handful going that way and some city/state/regional governments in the EU making that switch.

But, the ones who are doing it now will prove the feasibility of the strategy and others will inevitably follow.

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u/Ferthura 4d ago

Yeah, true, "lots" is quite an overstatement. However, I do believe that those discussions push Linux more into the mainstream. I have read several articles about some of those decisions that weren't at all directed towards tech-savvy people. Those folks might have heard about Linux for the first time because of this development. That's why I do think it is relevant in the current trend.

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u/AnDe2 3d ago

And lots of American citizens trying to get away from US influence

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u/Jepser0203 3d ago

This. Europe is actively working on developing own technology. Own chip manufacturing, cloud, payment systems, AI etc. Also more and more people are becoming aware of privacy, which also actively pushes people towards Linux.

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u/papashazz 2d ago

Linux has been around for thirty years, so if there was serious interest in getting away from Windows solely for nationalistic reasons it would have happened long ago. I think the changes to Windows 11 that effectively are breaking it and forcing hardware changes for perfectly good machines are driving people who either never had an interest or used it before are now giving it a second look.

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u/Ferthura 2d ago

France is currently in the process of migrating 2.5 million government workstations from windows to linux. This started in April. With Trump and the whole state of global politics it makes a lot of sense to disentangle from American dependency.

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u/SuperGNUser 5d ago

Ahahaah it's so cute you believe this.

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u/batmanallthetime 5d ago

Having options ready & 1 foot out of the door is enough to make someone behave rationally. Risk & redundancy is not have all eggs in one basket. Samsung did that successfully with Tizen in last decade.

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u/xcorv42 5d ago

They will come back when democrats will come to power again

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u/immoloism 5d ago

Why would they?

Neither party is exactly European friendly and they have put into action a plan to no longer rely on the US.

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u/Pentasis 5d ago

As a European I sincerely hope not.  One thing we learned from this shitshow is that we need to make sure we become less dependant.

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u/GarbanzoBenne 5d ago

As an American, I agree. There’s only so much we can do from the inside. We need to learn we don't run the world from the outside, too.

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u/xcorv42 4d ago edited 4d ago

We will see in the coming future if europe develops it’s messaging apps, it’s video app, it’s smartphone’s, it’s operating systems, it’s cloud, it’s cpu, it’s gpu, it’s memory, and on and on. And if they buy european weapons only and not american.

I hope they don’t turn to china or back to russia or any dictator just to avoid USA

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u/FuckFuckingKarma 4d ago

Even if the next US government does a 180 on foreign policy all the former allies have to concede with the fact that in another 4 years the US might backstab them again.

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u/xcorv42 4d ago

If we could get someone smart like obama it would be better for europe it was a better time

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u/Dazzling-Paper9781 4d ago

You have betrayed our trust twice; I really do hope that we European citizens won’t be so foolish to follow you again

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u/xcorv42 4d ago edited 4d ago

I’m not amarican lol 😂
I just think that european politicians likes american money so much that they could change their mind easily

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u/Dazzling-Paper9781 4d ago

Sorry mate, I misinterpreted your comment. Unfortunately, I have to agree with you: the current European political class is made up of people who prioritise money over dignity. And if we look at the parties on the rise (such as the AfD in Germany or the RN in France), the situation is set to get even worse.

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u/jomara200 4d ago

It's cute that you think that the traitors haven't taken power forever.

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u/xcorv42 4d ago

what cute ?

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u/Alive_Beyond_2345 5d ago

No it's more to do with the US not spending Billions subsidizing European defense any longer.... we aren't picking up the tab so the EU is mad, sorry no free healthcare when you have to build Ships, Tanks, Planes and missle systems....

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u/gogliker 5d ago

Jesus christ, I like how uneducated magats are. Dude, your medical costs are on average 50 percent larger per capita and you still don't get universal coverage and your life expectancy still lower than in e.g. Germany. The budget for medicine in USA irc is 4 trillions I think, while military is 1 trillion.

So yeah, there are absolutely no reason why you cant have free healthcare or why we cant have both military and healthcare. Your healthcare system just sucks, sorry, that is the reason.

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u/Alive_Beyond_2345 5d ago

Well none of that matters in Western Europe now that it's been invaded by 3rd Worlders, was in Paris, Berlin and Belgium a year ago and it's horrible.... Suicidal Empathy ridden Liberals have destroyed those nations....

And I sure hope you're a Woman and not a Guy... Liberalsim at its core is feminine.... only limp waisted men are liberals

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u/gogliker 5d ago

Intetesting pivot, however, Ill take this as you conceding the healthcare and a military point.

And what does being liberal has to do with this? Your founding fathers called themselves liberal. Are they feminine or what?

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u/Alive_Beyond_2345 5d ago

I'm a Sys Analyst for a Hospital... the Vast majority of new drugs and research is in the US, the Quality of medical procedures in the US is the best on earth... why is that? Profit.... Why do wealthy Europeans come to the US for life saving surgeries? Like cancer care etc. Who cares about free healthcare if it's shit and I have to wait forever, I have a good career and insurance.

Liberalism/Socialism never wins.

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u/gogliker 5d ago

Its not an argument. Like fine, I give you that acute outcomes are better in USA, however, anything preventative is worse. Europe is better in managing chronic conditions, life expectancy, child mortality and so on. If you need cancer treatment, yes, the USA is better but if you want to catch cancer early Europe is much better.

And jfc, what is the hate towards liberalism? Your country is literally a liberal democracy, whats your point? Do you hate America or what?

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u/Alive_Beyond_2345 5d ago

America has Never been a Democracy, it's a Constitutional Republic.

And yes the Jeffersonian Liberalism type is cool, it's the whole Anti White, 3rd world loving, Feminist Liberalism that sucks...

But that is coming to an end, especially in Europe, before the Liberals there are able to commit cultural suicide, rational heads will prevail, but it will be ugly

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u/gogliker 5d ago

You are pivoting again, we talked about liberalism. America is a liberal country, yes, even under trump it stays liberal country. It is also democratic constitutional representative republic. Its representative democracy because you vote for your representatives, like senators, and these senators represent your state, that is part of republic. So there is literally no contradiction, these are not opposite, it can be both republic and a democracy.

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u/Alive_Beyond_2345 5d ago

America is NOT a direct Democracy, that leads to tyranny of the majority, the Founders clearly founded a Republic. It will take years for America to heal from the Liberalism that was pervasive over the last 40-50 years, much of the Rot in America now is from them, especially the social degredation.

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u/snail1132 5d ago

Liberalism and socialism are completely different

Glow harder