Bottles
Hacker ApprovedShares rank 12 of 27 compatibility layers by recommenders
Free Linux app that makes running Windows programs with Wine simple, with an intuitive interface. Common caveat: some programs misbehave and use a lot of RAM.
Free Linux app that makes running Windows programs with Wine simple, with an intuitive interface. Common caveat: some programs misbehave and use a lot of RAM.
19 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 13
- criticize it
- 6
- approval share
- 68%
Recommended in 7 of 13 months
- November 2025: recommended
- December 2025: recommended
- January 2026: recommended
- February 2026: not recommended
- March 2026: recommended
- April 2026: not recommended
- May 2026: not recommended
- June 2026: recommended
- July 2026: not recommended
- August 2026: recommended
- September 2026: recommended
- October 2026: not recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it carries the badge
- 13 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, met.
- 2.2 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, met.
- Recommended in 7 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Easy to run Windows apps
“relatively easy to run (most) Windows apps they love through Bottles”
Comment from 7 Nov 2025 in “YouTube Removes Windows 11 Bypass Tutorials, Claims 'Risk of Physical Harm'” “the bottles did make some Adobe products easier to use”
Comment from 15 Nov 2025 in “I didn't reverse-engineer the protocol for my blood pressure monitor in 24 hours” “had more success with the Bottles flatpak instead”
Comment from 12 Dec 2025 in “Laying out the 404 Media zine” Clear Wine management interface
“it's a straightforward way to run apps with Wine with an intuitive and pretty interface”
Comment from 12 Nov 2025 in “I didn't reverse-engineer the protocol for my blood pressure monitor in 24 hours” “an amazing Wine managing software called Bottle”
Comment from 13 Nov 2025 in “Steam Machine” Good, free quality software
“At least Bottles is really good and not just slop”
Comment from 13 Sep 2026 in “Cpak – OCI application package format for Linux desktops, servers and devices” “Most of the stuff I use is free and excellent.”
Comment from 8 Aug 2026 in “Improving GPT-5.6 Sol in ChatGPT—and expanding access for free users”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Trouble with programs and UI
“programs misbehave cause it to eat up all my ram when using bottles for instance”
Comment from 19 Jan 2026 in “Wine 11.0” “i always have trouble with Bottles. And not just the slightly bad UI”
Comment from 14 Sep 2026 in “Cpak – OCI application package format for Linux desktops, servers and devices”
Other compatibility layers people recommend
The four most recommended other compatibility layers, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Proton by Valve | 451 | 189 | 70% | 13 | 2 yrs31 owners | Approved |
| Wine | 329 | 88 | 79% | 13 | 10 yrs11 owners | Approved |
| Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) | 159 | 101 | 61% | 12 | 3 yrs9 owners | — |
| WSL2 (Windows Subsystem for Linux) | 115 | 55 | 68% | 12 | — | Approved |
| BottlesThis page | 13 | 6 | 68% | 7 | — | Approved |
What people said
17 of the 19 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“i always have trouble with Bottles. And not just the slightly bad UI”
“At least Bottles is really good and not just slop”
“It's fair to say most of them are AI generated nowadays.”
“Most of the stuff I use is free and excellent.”
“If you ever tried to run an .exe through flatpak'd bottles”
“I wasn't entirely happy with the existing Wine launchers”
“see Bottles for an example”
“programs misbehave cause it to eat up all my ram when using bottles for instance”
“Ableton even has a Bottles configuration available, which is a one-click GUI install”
“the hours required to brute force the right Wine/Proton setup for every game”
“single file web server microframework, no dependencies”
“had more success with the Bottles flatpak instead”
“A bad idea in retrospect, but hard to change now”
“the bottles did make some Adobe products easier to use”
“an amazing Wine managing software called Bottle”
“it's a straightforward way to run apps with Wine with an intuitive and pretty interface”
“relatively easy to run (most) Windows apps they love through Bottles”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.