Openbox
Hacker ApprovedShares rank 8 of 30 window managers by recommenders
Light, quick window manager with text-based config that people run for years because it stays out of the way and does what they need.
Light, quick window manager with text-based config that people run for years because it stays out of the way and does what they need.
16 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 15
- criticize it
- 1
- approval share
- 94%
Recommended in 7 of 13 months
- November 2025: not recommended
- December 2025: recommended
- January 2026: recommended
- February 2026: recommended
- March 2026: recommended
- April 2026: not recommended
- May 2026: recommended
- June 2026: not 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
- 15 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, met.
- 15 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
Used reliably for many years
“I've run Openbox/Blackbox on Linux for ~15 years and never had these issues.”
Comment from 11 Jan 2026 in “I dumped Windows 11 for Linux, and you should too” “Always used flux/openbox whenever I could on my own workstations”
Comment from 7 Mar 2026 in “Plasma Bigscreen – 10-foot interface for KDE plasma” “I'll stick to xorg and openbox for many years to come.”
Comment from 4 Jan 2026 in “Can I start using Wayland in 2026?” - Comment from 20 Sep 2026 in “KDE turns 30 and someone's brought an AI-native desktop proposal”
Does everything needed without limits
“It doesn't get in the way, and I don't need more.”
Comment from 3 May 2026 in “Why TUIs Are Back” “Openbox does everything I need it to.”
Comment from 10 Jan 2026 in “I replaced Windows with Linux and everything's going great” “Openbox isn't limiting me”
Comment from 21 Jan 2026 in “200 MB RAM FreeBSD Desktop” Light and quick on minimal desktops
“a light window manager such as Fluxbox/Openbox could make run machine run well”
Comment from 18 Feb 2026 in “Meta to retire messenger desktop app and messenger.com in April 2026” “how quick and well put together Openbox and text based config files are”
Comment from 21 Jan 2026 in “200 MB RAM FreeBSD Desktop” “a respected piece of software, commonly used on minimal Linux desktops”
Comment from 3 Feb 2026 in “Todd C. Miller – sudo Maintainer for over 30 years” Good looks and themes out of box
“XFWM from XFCE, Fluxbox/OpenBox have nearly every titlebar theme in existence”
Comment from 13 Jan 2026 in “Windows 8 Desktop Environment for Linux” “Openbox/labwc looks great out the box without this flailing about.”
Comment from 24 May 2026 in “Your Dotfiles Are Not a Distro”
Other window managers people recommend
The four most recommended other window managers, 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hyprland | 82 | 33 | 71% | 12 | 1 mo4 owners | Approved |
| Rectangle for macOS | 67 | 3 | 96% | 11 | 1 yr3 owners | Approved |
| Enlightenment window manager | 51 | 19 | 73% | 8 | — | Approved |
| FVWM | 28 | 4 | 88% | 8 | 25 yrs7 owners | Approved |
| OpenboxThis page | 15 | 1 | 94% | 7 | — | Approved |
What people said
21 of the 23 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“Don't need to be so drastic, XFCE, Afterstep, windowmaker, Openbox, Enlightment”
“Configure a simple window manager like openbox or dwm.”
“That's why I stuck to openbox/labwc.”
“Yes it's a very limited compositor but frankly so is openbox and xfce”
“Openbox/labwc looks great out the box without this flailing about.”
“It doesn't get in the way, and I don't need more.”
“Always used flux/openbox whenever I could on my own workstations”
“probably the one I enjoyed most was OpenBox which is the least like a minimal WM”
“a light window manager such as Fluxbox/Openbox could make run machine run well”
“a respected piece of software, commonly used on minimal Linux desktops”
“You can still do that. Build a config for openbox or dwm.”
“I wouldn't want to go back to using them”
“how quick and well put together Openbox and text based config files are”
“Openbox isn't limiting me”
“Or you can ignore all that nonsense and run openbox and native tools.”
“Not the case wifh Fluxbox/Openbox/Blackbox.”
“XFWM from XFCE, Fluxbox/OpenBox have nearly every titlebar theme in existence”
“I've run Openbox/Blackbox on Linux for ~15 years and never had these issues.”
“Openbox does everything I need it to.”
“feel pretty at home with xfce or openbox”
“I'll stick to xorg and openbox for many years to come.”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.