# X11 (X.Org) 140 Hacker News commenters recommended X11 (X.Org) and 102 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 12 of 13 months; owners who said how long report a median of 20 years (9 owners). **Verdict:** A mature, stable display server valued for network transparency, accessibility and automation tools, and features Wayland still lacks; critics cite outdated design, security holes and poor mixed-monitor support. ## Why people recommend it - Stable and reliable for years (5 comments): "Maintenance mode sounds like a good thing, not something that makes me tempted to switch to some less stable alternative." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45926531)) "X11 could happily run over a year without crash and run all applications I need without issues" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46381864)) "I'm using X11 every day on my personal machines and don't see a need to switch at this time." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47393668)) - Features and compatibility Wayland lacks (5 comments): "the alternative one (Wayland) has nowhere near the level and quality of support and breadth of capabilities as the existing one" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49385497)) "There is absolutely no need to break 40 years of graphic software, or throw away 40 years of accumulated features." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45800266)) "software developers should target an implementation of whatever missing feature as implemented in X11" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47448789)) - Network transparency and X forwarding (4 comments): "Starting a GUI app on any machine on the network and have its windows display on my local screen is vital functionality." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45952040)) "its crazy to me that this anyone can claim X11 can't be off loaded, which its been doing for decades" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46089174)) "Using X forward basically every day but being told it is useless and broken and nobody needs it" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48911756)) - Accessibility and automation support (3 comments): "the lack of deep level accessibility/automation is still a big hurdle when it comes to Wayland" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48919392)) "In X11 I can create an automation tool that works regardless of the underlying WM" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47480367)) "Until Wayland actually has an accesibility story, X is really the only choice." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46382341)) ## What people warn about - Outdated, crufty core design (6 comments): "fundamentally it's an really outdated design to solve 80s/90s issues over the network in the way you solved it back then" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47486015)) "The problem with X11 is that it has for a long time exposed too much unrelated functionality like this to the user" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47483933)) "X11's problems were rooted in the abstractions presented by the X11 core protocol and its extension mechanisms." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47449513)) - No isolation, enables keyloggers (3 comments): "as long as you run X11, there is no need to think about security because X11 just defeats it all" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47449353)) "Wayland also plugs pretty big security holes in X, like the ability to implement global keyloggers." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46145045)) "Even under X11, any app can log keystrokes, read window contents, and inject input into other apps." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47449017)) - Poor mixed-monitor scaling and refresh (2 comments): "with x11 if you go through the steps to get Variable Refresh Rate going and you are dual monitor, it will max the refresh of both to the slowest monitor." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46585115)) "X11 won't handle different scales, and it also won't switch from one to the other without restarting it." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46798706)) - Tearing and rendering glitches (2 comments): "there are some edge cases for X11 with non-compositing window manager where you will get interesting glitches if the window moves" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48257761)) "Out of the box I used have more problem with X11 (tearing and font rendering being the most annoyingly common ones)" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46383679)) ## Alternatives hackers recommend - [Wayland](https://hackerapproved.com/p/wayland.md): 272 recommend - [Xorg](https://hackerapproved.com/p/xorg.md): 40 recommend - [XLibre](https://hackerapproved.com/p/xlibre.md): 31 recommend - [X Window System](https://hackerapproved.com/p/x-window-system.md): 27 recommend - [Arcan](https://hackerapproved.com/p/arcan.md): 15 recommend ## Cite as Hacker Approved, "X11 (X.Org)", https://hackerapproved.com/p/x11/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).