# Crostini

8 Hacker News commenters recommended Crostini and 4 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 3 of 13 months.

**Verdict:** Free Linux environment built into ChromeOS for Linux apps and dev tools; critics call it unreliable and restricted.

## Why people recommend it

- Remote access to Linux machines (2 comments): "Crostini is kind of a joke, but I use it to remote into real Linux boxes." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48114585)) "Just use Chromebook via Crostini to remote access a headless Linux box." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48114621))
- Heavy Linux tools on cheap hardware (2 comments): "With the addition of Linux/Crostini, there's 3D modeling, CAD, and NLE video editing and compilers" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47340677)) "WSL and Crostini achieves this on vastly weaker hardware with great results." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47551746))

## What people warn about

- Unreliable, feels like beta (2 comments): "crostini is so hopelessly unreliable it felt like it never got out of beta" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48116479)) "Crostini has been WIP for years" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48059518))

## Alternatives hackers recommend

- [QEMU](https://hackerapproved.com/p/qemu.md): 114 recommend
- [UTM](https://hackerapproved.com/p/utm.md): 49 recommend
- [VirtualBox](https://hackerapproved.com/p/virtualbox.md): 34 recommend
- [Lima](https://hackerapproved.com/p/lima.md): 31 recommend
- [Vagrant](https://hackerapproved.com/p/vagrant.md): 25 recommend

## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "Crostini", https://hackerapproved.com/p/crostini/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).