Manjaro Linux
Shares rank 23 of 63 Linux distributions by recommenders
Recommended for an easy-to-install Arch-based Linux with up-to-date software and easy software installs. Critics point to update breakage and repository problems.
Recommended for an easy-to-install Arch-based Linux with up-to-date software and easy software installs. Critics point to update breakage and repository problems.
64 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 30
- criticize it
- 34
- approval share
- 47%
Recommended in 11 of 13 months
- November 2025: recommended
- December 2025: recommended
- January 2026: recommended
- February 2026: recommended
- March 2026: recommended
- April 2026: recommended
- May 2026: recommended
- June 2026: recommended
- July 2026: recommended
- August 2026: recommended
- September 2026: not recommended
- October 2026: recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Owned for 8 years
Median of the 4 owners who said how long they have had it.
Each square is one year.
Why it doesn’t carry the badge
- 30 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, met.
- 0.8 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, not met.
- Recommended in 11 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
Rolling releases with up-to-date software
“I'd recommend a rolling release distro like manjaro (arch) or fedora, so you get latest drivers and whatnot fast.”
Comment from 2 Apr 2026 in “Steam on Linux Use Skyrocketed Above 5% in March” “Even running a rolling release distro (Manjaro) has been fine on a laptop that was designed for Linux”
Comment from 20 Oct 2026 in “NixOS is making me less afraid” “PopOS and Manjaro (IIRC) were the distros to game on, if you wanted up-to-date OOTB working drivers”
Comment from 10 Jan 2026 in “I replaced Windows with Linux and everything's going great” - Comment from 11 Jan 2026 in “I replaced Windows with Linux and everything's going great”
- Comment from 21 Mar 2026 in “Our Commitment to Windows Quality”
- Comment from 22 Dec 2025 in “Debian's Git Transition”
Easy software installs and builds
“My favourite feature of Manjaro (and presumably Arch) is how easily I can install almost any software from a single package manager”
Comment from 6 May 2026 in “Fedora is now the default Linux recommendation, and Ubuntu did this to itself” “it just works and installing software is a breeze with Manjaro's graphical UI (pamac)”
Comment from 31 Aug 2026 in “Omarchy: Any User Process Can Escalate to Root” “it makes many things - including compiling from source - simple”
Comment from 13 Jun 2026 in “Arch Linux Now Believes Malware Incident Under Control: More Than 1,500 Packages” Friendly, polished out of the box
“You can install Fedora Linux, Linux Mint or Manjaro, and it's more user friendly than Windows 11 and macOS.”
Comment from 8 Apr 2026 in “Veracrypt Project Update” “rolling updates + being more noob friendly than arch sounded good”
Comment from 11 Jan 2026 in “I replaced Windows with Linux and everything's going great” “up to date software and a polished out of the box experience”
Comment from 21 Mar 2026 in “Our Commitment to Windows Quality” Works well as a base system
“Even running a rolling release distro (Manjaro) has been fine on a laptop that was designed for Linux”
Comment from 20 Oct 2026 in “NixOS is making me less afraid” “Right now my base system is manjaro, which works very well as a base system”
Comment from 29 Jun 2026 in “NixOS 26.05 Released” “it works quite well as base system”
Comment from 30 Jun 2026 in “Knoppix”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Updates that break or stop booting
“liked Manjaro (Arch) until pacman stopped working for some reason”
Comment from 24 Jul 2026 in “Ask HN: What Linux distro do you daily drive?” “Arch, but with additional weird package management upgrade issues that are a byproduct of Manjaro's own repositories”
Comment from 1 Mar 2026 in “Manjaro website off-line again due to lapsed certificate” “use dodgy repos like Manjaro, then risk of update woes will increase significantly”
Comment from 17 Mar 2026 in “OpenSUSE Kalpa” - Comment from 28 Jan 2026 in “Microsoft forced me to switch to Linux”
- Comment from 23 Dec 2025 in “The post-GeForce era: What if Nvidia abandons PC gaming?”
- Comment from 11 Jan 2026 in “I replaced Windows with Linux and everything's going great”
Seen as lower quality
“It's alright. But a bit of a mess from a ux point of view.”
Comment from 12 Jan 2026 in “The struggle of resizing windows on macOS Tahoe” “I'm 100% confident saying that nothing Manjaro provided was important.”
Comment from 9 Sep 2026 in “DHH's Omarchy Considering Replacing Arch/AUR with Nix” “Stop using Manjaro. It's much lower quality than a serious distro.”
Comment from 24 Dec 2025 in “The post-GeForce era: What if Nvidia abandons PC gaming?” Conflicting repos and AUR packages
“Arch, but with additional weird package management upgrade issues that are a byproduct of Manjaro's own repositories”
Comment from 1 Mar 2026 in “Manjaro website off-line again due to lapsed certificate” “When Manjaro's repos conflicted with AUR pkgbuilds, thousands of their users didn't understand”
Comment from 30 Aug 2026 in “Omarchy: Any User Process Can Escalate to Root” “use dodgy repos like Manjaro, then risk of update woes will increase significantly”
Comment from 17 Mar 2026 in “OpenSUSE Kalpa”
Other Linux distributions people recommend
The four most recommended other Linux distributions, 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ubuntu | 560 | 493 | 53% | 12 | 10 yrs116 owners | — |
| Debian | 552 | 191 | 74% | 13 | 10 yrs62 owners | Approved |
| NixOS | 454 | 112 | 80% | 13 | 2 yrs69 owners | Approved |
| Fedora Linux | 437 | 131 | 77% | 12 | 2 yrs72 owners | Approved |
| Manjaro LinuxThis page | 30 | 34 | 47% | 11 | 8 yrs4 owners | — |
What people said
40 of the 83 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“Even running a rolling release distro (Manjaro) has been fine on a laptop that was designed for Linux”
“I'm 100% confident saying that nothing Manjaro provided was important.”
“it just works and installing software is a breeze with Manjaro's graphical UI (pamac)”
“When Manjaro's repos conflicted with AUR pkgbuilds, thousands of their users didn't understand”
“Manjaro did what Omarchy did a decade ago, and better.”
“Installing Manjaro (Arch), XFCE and kernel 6.18.”
“liked Manjaro (Arch) until pacman stopped working for some reason”
“I'd also check out Manjaro which runs arch in the background.”
“it works quite well as base system”
“Right now my base system is manjaro, which works very well as a base system”
“my laptop and my server run Linux (Fedora and Ubuntu) and I go weeks without ever powering-on my windows box. It's really great!”
“it makes many things - including compiling from source - simple”
“I would say any of Manjaro, Suse, Debian, Ubuntu, Mint, Fedora, RH and many more.”
“It's a great middle ground between Ubuntu and rawdogging pacstrap.”
“My favourite feature of Manjaro (and presumably Arch) is how easily I can install almost any software from a single package manager”
“You can install Fedora Linux, Linux Mint or Manjaro, and it's more user friendly than Windows 11 and macOS.”
“I'd recommend a rolling release distro like manjaro (arch) or fedora, so you get latest drivers and whatnot fast.”
“chances are you're supported wonderfully well at this very moment”
“up to date software and a polished out of the box experience”
“use dodgy repos like Manjaro, then risk of update woes will increase significantly”
“Arch, but with additional weird package management upgrade issues that are a byproduct of Manjaro's own repositories”
“their certificate issues and its recursive behaviour threaten me a little bit”
“it's bit more capable but nothing crazy tho since it's nearly 15 yo machine”
“despite the drawback that is systemd”
“Love Linux, been using Manjaro with Gnome for the last 10 years”
“Manjaro does this semi-okay with its two weeks grace period”
“In the past with Manjaro I did a system update with Pacman, and problems ensued.”
“those are very convenient distros for Arch”
“It's alright. But a bit of a mess from a ux point of view.”
“rolling updates + being more noob friendly than arch sounded good”
“But then another smaller update out of blue made system unbootable”
“PopOS and Manjaro (IIRC) were the distros to game on, if you wanted up-to-date OOTB working drivers”
“Stop using Manjaro. It's much lower quality than a serious distro.”
“an upgrade can leave you unable to boot into a graphical login screen”
“manjaro moves forward like 100x faster”
“it was actually more convenient to install the KDE version and then install i3 on top”
“Just because you can't install it does not mean it is not good for other people.”
“it had really nice I3, bspwm, and xmonad distributions”
“So Manjaro with Plasma is my choice.”
“Try an Arch linux based distro, Omarchy or Manjaro.”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.