paru
Aur helper in Developer tools
An Arch Linux AUR helper that shows PKGBUILD diffs before installing and makes finding and installing packages easy. One critic has switched to yay instead.
5 people recommended paru in Hacker News comments, 1 had mixed feelings and 1 criticized it, November 2025 to October 2026.
Summary written by Claude from 6 comments.
7 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 5
- mixed feelings
- 1
- warn against or regret it
- 1
The record
Recommended in 2 of 12 months
In 3 different threads.
- November 2025: not recommended
- December 2025: not recommended
- January 2026: not recommended
- February 2026: recommended
- March 2026: not recommended
- April 2026: not recommended
- May 2026: not recommended
- June 2026: recommended
- July 2026: not recommended
- August 2026: not recommended
- September 2026: not recommended
- October 2026: not recommended
Why it doesn’t carry the badge
- 5 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, not met.
- 5 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, met.
- Recommended in 2 of 12 monthsNeeds 4 or more, not met.
- Recommended in 3 threadsNeeds 5 or more, not met.
- The biggest thread supplies 40% of its recommendersNeeds half or less, met.
The same rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. Mixed feelings count toward neither side. How the badge works
What people say about it
Reasons grouped from a sample of 6 of the 7 opinions about it, picked in proportion to how many people recommend it, have mixed feelings and criticize it. Each mark is one comment in the sample. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Easy package search and install
“paru $PKG_NAME will give you a list of all possible packages relating to that”
Comment from 11 Feb 2026 in “The Switch to Linux and the Beginning of My Self-Hosting Journey” “You can open a terminal and type `paru jetbrains-toolbox”
Comment from 10 Feb 2026 in “The Switch to Linux and the Beginning of My Self-Hosting Journey” “paru makes it really easy”
Comment from 12 Jun 2026 in “AUR Packages Compromised with Infostealer and Rootkit”
What people recommend instead
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 | Mixed | Criticize | Approval | Months | Had for | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| yay | 8 | 3 | 6 | 57% | 5 | — | — |
| paruThis page | 5 | 1 | 1 | 83% | 2 | — | — |
What people said
6 of the 7 opinions about it, picked in proportion to the three counts, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“Seems it is time I dump paru for yay.”
“super kudos to paru's creator for the nagging warning about installed orphan packages that made me remove them immediately”
“paru makes it really easy”
“paru presents all pkgbuild diffs to you before installing, that's what I use to read them.”
“paru $PKG_NAME will give you a list of all possible packages relating to that”
“You can open a terminal and type `paru jetbrains-toolbox”
Counts come from 1,791,911 Hacker News comments labeled by Claude, November 2025 to October 2026, with data through October 31, 2026. Counts updated 2 Nov 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.