 there are approximately 10 million Linux distributions. Okay, so maybe that is a little bit of an X overestimation, but there are a ton of Linux distributions out there, and we know that because if we go to DistroWatch, our favorite site, you'll know just by searching that you can scroll through Linux distributions for days and days and days, and there's just a ton of them out there. So one of the things that allow a distro to differentiate themselves from other distros is the look and feel of their desktop environment, whatever desktop environment they've chosen, right? So things like theming and icons and cursors and those kind of things, those all kind of play into how a distro differentiates itself from one another. There's a reason why it's okay for there to be 12 dozen art space distros out there. They all try to at least look a little bit different. So what I thought I would do today is talk about the top five Linux distributions that are the best looking according to me. Now I want to very much emphasize the according to me part of that statement because when it comes to what's good looking, what I think is that is not necessarily what you think is good looking, right? It might be that you really like the deep end desktop environment. You might think that that is the most gorgeous piece of desktop environment you've ever seen in your life and you just want to use it all day long. Me personally, I don't like it. I don't really care for the aesthetic all that much. It's just kind of my opinion. So when it comes to making a list like this, it's very much a subjective thing. So just keep that in mind. What I think is the best looking isn't necessarily the official be all end all opinion on the matter. It's perfectly fine. If you're just getting into Linux to try all of them, try everything as much as you can. Eventually you'll find what's good for you. So let's go ahead and jump in. The first one on the list is Gerudo Linux. Now, if you're watching the b-roll now that should just be popping up just about now, you'll notice that this is very flashy. Like this is definitely not going to be for everyone. This is a distribution that takes design very seriously. The developers have a very eclectic idea of what good design is. That's for sure, but it does stand out. Like you're not going to find another Linux distribution that looks like this one unless they've blatantly copied it, right? This looks very unique and that's why it's on the list. It's definitely a good looking distribution if you like this kind of thing. And I happen to like it quite a lot. It's unique, right? It's definitely not something that you're going to find other places. So let's talk a little bit about the particulars. This is based on Arch Linux. That means that you're going to have access to things like AUR, which means you're not going to have any problems with finding software. You're going to be able to pretty much download whatever you want. All of the software comes from either managing that in the terminal, like you would if you use regular Arch or using the Octopi package manager, which comes pre-installed. Personally, I'm not a big fan of Octopi. I think it's overly confusing. Definitely not as good as PAMAC in terms of being able to manage software on Arch. But if you need a GUI package manager, Octopi is installed by default. It uses ButterFest by default, which is the only one that does that on this list. And that's significant, I think, because I think ButterFest is fantastic. It also includes snapper and snapper tools out of the box so that when you do an update, it's going to automatically create a snapshot for you. That means that if an update breaks your computer, you can roll back if you need to. That is really cool, right? It also has an amazing feature. So after you've done your install, it will offer you the opportunity to go through a ton of categories, like a literal ton of categories of software to choose what you want to install. By default, there's not a lot installed on the ISO. It's just kind of barren. And it's that by default, because it wants you afterwards after you've installed it to choose the packages that you need. So it's kind of following the Arch Linux philosophy in that you kind of build things up on your own. Now, obviously it is not as difficult to install as Arch Linux. It uses the Calamari's installer, but it does give you that option to at least build up some of your package stuff on your own. Finally, it has several different versions, but the KDE version which you're seeing here, this is the Dragonized version actually. They use KDE Plasma, but the KDE Plasma is the default one. Okay, moving on to the next distro on the list. That is elementary OS. Elementary OS is probably one that a lot of people expected to be quite high on the list. And number four is about as high as I would ever put it. Frankly, I'm pretty sure that I'm not going to put this on the next year's list of this, because while it does look nice, it's a very good looking distribution. If you like the macOS aesthetic from like five years ago or so, this aesthetic will do well for you because it looks like macOS from about five years ago. It's not so much the new macOS where it's all transparency and big buttons. This is very much more of a chrome-like, scuromorphic kind of design that macOS is well known for a few years ago. It's based on Ubuntu, so you'll have access to a lot of software and it's meant to be very, very stable. One of the things that is definitely true about it is that they have a very strict UI guideline system, which means that any applications that they use by default look basically the same. So you're going to have a high level of consistency across the entire operating system outside of third-party applications. If you download third-party applications that don't follow the UI guidelines, they're not going to look the same. But they try as hard as they can to make sure that every application you use looks exactly the same. In the most recent version, they did include a dark mode, which looks fantastic. Their dark mode looks amazing. It's way better than their light mode. They should just get rid of the light mode completely, but that's just my opinion. It is by far the best mac-like experience you'll find out of the box on Linux. It's really, really good. And it takes the Mac part really seriously in that it's very focused on UI consistency, having control over where your applications come from and things like that. If you've used Mac before, you'll be very happy in elementary OS, probably. There are a few downsides. The updates for this operating system are notoriously slow. So if you need up-to-date packages, elementary OS is probably not going to be right for you. Just keep that in mind if you decide to try it. The other thing that you'll need to know is that the App Store, which is the elementary OS App Center, is a very well-designed App Center, but it's not really all that well-stocked. You can download things from FlatHub if you want to, and you'll probably have to because it doesn't even include any browsers or office software inside of the App Center. You have to go get that from the FlatHub. So just keep that in mind. Finally, it uses the Pantheon desktop, which is GTK-based. So if you manage to escape outside of the walled garden that is elementary OS, you can customize using things like elementary tweaks, which will allow you to theme it to your heart's content. So that is elementary OS. The next one on the list is Manjaro. Now, Manjaro, specifically the KDE version of Manjaro, is probably the most vanilla of the distros that I'm talking about today. And the reason why it's on there is because a lot of people actually like the look of Manjaro, and I happen to be one of them. I think that they've done a really nice job of keeping things very, very simple. It does look basically like a KDE desktop, but they have their own theme, their own color scheme. They've done a good job of selecting wallpapers, and it's a very well put together distribution that is not as flashy as others, but does a really good job of just being decent looking, right? It's not something that is going to blow you out of the water, but still very much one of those distributions that does a good job of feeling very cohesive and nicely designed. I like the themeing. I like the color palette that they've chosen. I always have that Manjaro green that just kind of stands out amongst all the other themes that you could possibly choose. I mean, a lot of people have, a lot of theme developers have taken that color scheme and kind of ran with it. So it's proven to be very popular. Now, a few particulars, it's based on ARCH. So again, you're going to have access to things like that you are. It uses Pamek as the GUI front end for your software center. It is not the best software center in the world. It is not the worst. I'm not actually sure if this is true or not. I think it might come with this cover. If you use the KDE Plasma version, I'm not actually sure about that, to be honest with you. I didn't check that. It's been quite a while since I've actually used Manjaro, but it's possible that it does. And while I'm focusing on the KDE version, which is what you're seeing in the B-roll, Manjaro does come with XFC and GNOME versions officially and several other community editions if you're looking at using something a little bit different. The XFC and GNOME versions being official versions are also very well styled. So they all have the same basic color schemes, but they all do a very good job of being a well-designed desktop environment on top of a distro. So you won't be losing anything if you decide not to go with KDE and decide to go with GNOME. They really do look similar and that they at least use the same color scheme. So that's something to keep in mind. So that is Manjaro. The second to last distribution on the list is called PopOS. Now, PopOS is an interesting distribution in that it is developed by a hardware manufacturer that focuses on Linux laptops and desktops. And that is one thing to keep in mind if you decide to use this, is that it tends to be very much a distribution that can work well on a wide variety of hardware. So if you're looking for something that needs to run, say, an NVIDIA driver, PopOS has an ISO that has NVIDIA built right in and it works really well. But that's not really why we're here. We're looking at the look and feel. In terms of how it looks, out of the box, I actually don't care for it all that much to be honest with you. That long bar along the bottom doesn't really do anything for me. So the first thing I always do, and you'll see this in the B roll, is I change that so that the panel is just along the bottom. It looks 10 times better out of the box like that. And that's just my opinion, but I think that that should be default. In terms of theming, it's a brighter version of like GrubBox, which is why I like it. GrubBox is one of my favorite versions that use kind of that dark brown color as the base. And it's really, really nice. I like this theme quite a lot. And they haven't exactly copied like GrubBox. It's like not 100% GrubBox. They have like a teal color blue as their secondary color and a yellow color that goes along with that. It just all goes together really nicely. And it's just something that I find very aesthetically pleasing. So now for a few particulars, it's based on the Ubuntu LTS. I believe they have actually come out with the Ubuntu LTS 22.4 version. So that is something that is nice. It's definitely different than something like elementary OS, which is notoriously slow when it comes to update. This one, PopOS actually updates really quickly when a new version of Ubuntu comes out. It uses the Popster, which is actually based on the elementary OS app center. So if you notice, those are actually very similar because they are exactly the same. But the difference is that the PopStore does pull from different software sources so that you have a much wider version of software than you do in elementary OS. It also uses the elementary OS installer, which is a departure from what Ubuntu uses, which is the Ubiquity installer. So that is something, again, to keep in mind. Finally, it uses the Cosmic Desktop. And this is based on GNOME. And it actually is GNOME, by the way. It just is GNOME with many different extensions on top of it to make it look a little bit different. So if you are familiar with GNOME, it'll be very easy for you to customize this. It does have a light and dark mode, like pretty much all these that I've talked about. It doesn't have some of the GNOME features that you would expect if you've used GNOME on other distributions. So it doesn't have the accent colors that stuff hasn't been built in yet. So that's just something that you need to keep in mind. If you are looking for this to be exactly like GNOME elsewhere, you're going to be a little bit disappointed. It's still really very good. One other thing to keep in mind is that if you're watching this video in the future, like a couple of years in the future, this may not be all that accurate anymore because POPOS is actually moving away from GNOME and creating their own desktop environment where it didn't rust. Called the Cosmic Desktop still, but it's going to be a little bit different. It'll probably look basically the same and have most of the same features, but it won't be GNOME anymore. So just keep it in mind. The last one on the list is ZorinOS. And ZorinOS is based on Ubuntu, like several of the other ones on this list. So you can expect to have a wide range of software. And it uses by default two different desktop environments. The one that you're seeing now is GNOME and they also have an XFCE version. Both of those are free versions and they're both very well designed and very similar in terms of functionality. The XFCE version is a little bit better in terms of resource usage just because XFCE is much lighter than GNOME, but they do have quite a few of the same features. They also have a pro version that you can pay for. I believe that also uses GNOME. I'm not actually sure. I've never paid for it to try it out. So if that's something that you're interested in, it basically comes with a whole bunch of software pre-installed. That's basically what you're paying for then, some customer service. So that's something you might be able to consider if you decide you really like ZorinOS. But that's probably for the future. In terms of look and feel, you'll notice that this has a ton of customization. And if you've used GNOME in the past, you'll know that that's a little weird, right? Zorin has done a very good job of making GNOME really customizable. So in addition to dark and light themes, you also have a ton of accent colors or at least a few accent colors that you can then select that will filter throughout the entire distro, which is really nice. Some of them aren't really all that great. Looking in my opinion, like the orange one kind of looks more brown to me, but the other ones are actually really nice. And like I said, it filters throughout the entire distro. So it changes the icon theme. It changes the look and feel of the windows. It's really nice. ZorinOS also offers four different layouts for you. So there's a Mac-like one or at least a traditional GNOME-like one that has the hidden panel along the side. It has a couple of different Windows versions. And they're really nice. And they're very quick to change. Even in the VM that you're watching me chest this in now, the layouts pop up pretty much instantaneously. That's not always a given in these distros that have this type of changer. A lot of times they take quite a while for the change to actually take place. And a lot of times it actually resets your entire session, which is a little weird, but this one doesn't do that. It's almost instantaneously, it's really, really good. In terms of software, it uses the GNOME Software Center as the app store. And it focuses on flat packs and flat hub by default. So you have a very wide range of software in addition to the Ubuntu repositories. So you shouldn't have any problems finding the software that you need. And the reason why I've put this number one is simply because it has a lot of customization for it without being so overwhelming like the KDE versions or the KDE distros that I've talked about today. And it just feels very cohesive. It's one of those things where you can change the between the dark and light theme and every thing changes to dark and light. It uses a GTK theme that just kind of propagates throughout the entire system no matter what applications you're using. As long as they're GTK, they work really well. And it just feels like a very nice put together experience and it just looks amazing, right? So that's why it's number one on my list. Now, I wanna talk a little bit about a couple honorable mentions. Things that didn't quite make the list and I know other people like so I wanted to kind of put them on here. The first one is Deepin OS. I didn't put Deepin OS on here because it's still got that kind of shade of being from China on here. So I don't know whether or not that matters to anybody or not anymore but there's still some kind of reputation there for maybe not being as secure as the other distributions but whether or not that's true and that's not really for me to say but it does garner a lot of attention because it's very unique in terms of look and feel and customization. So if that's something that interests you I'll try to put a screenshot of it here. I didn't actually record any B-roll of that but it is nice looking if that's your kind of thing. And similarly, the other honorable mention that I wanted to talk about is QtFishOS. Now, I didn't put QtFish on here because to me it's still very much in beta. It's not a desktop environment slash distro that you can honestly use and think that it's 100% complete. It's still very, very new. It's only like a year and a half old. They've done a phenomenal job of making it usable but there's still quite a few things that are just there that are not missing but that being said, if and when it does get done it will probably take over for elementary OS as the best Mac-like experience because it looks like an iPad basically. It looks like they took the iPad operating system and put it in on Linux and it looks very, very nice, right? But like I said, it's not quite complete yet so I left that off the list in terms of actually putting it in the top five. So those are the top five best looking distributions in my opinion along with a couple honorable mentions. I again think that these are all my opinions so I'm not pushing this on anybody. These are just things that I find very good looking and I would be happy using them no matter what. These are things that I probably would never change the theme on if I were to use them. I think probably. Everybody knows how I like to customize things so I might not be saying the truth there, I don't know. But the point is that they're all very good looking distributions. So in the comment section below I would love to hear from you. What are your best looking distributions? I wanna hear from you in the comment section below. You can follow me on Twitter, at the Linuxcast. You can follow me on Mastodon or any of my other social media networks. You can find those links in the video description. You can support me on Patreon at patreon.com slash Linuxcast. I'd like to take a moment to thank my current patrons. All of you are amazing, amazing people. I can't even ever find the words to say how grateful I am for all of you who support me on Patreon and YouTube. Just thank you so very much. I know that in this day and age it's kind of hard to support just a little YouTuber but I do appreciate it so very much. So thanks everybody for your support. Thanks everybody for watching. I'll see you next time.