# Zoom 99 Hacker News commenters recommended Zoom and 155 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 12 of 13 months; owners who said how long report a median of 5 years (5 owners). **Verdict:** Recommended for video calls that just work, with polished UX that many find better than Teams or Meet; critics cite privacy and security lapses and a troublesome Linux client. ## Why people recommend it - Joining meetings just works (5 comments): "Zoom will never lock up letting you join a meeting because someone decided you need to reauthenticate Teams regularly." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45934413)) "I just hit "join meeting" on a tablet in the meeting room and it'll join the meeting and pretty much just work." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49693132)) "I have weekly Zoom meetings and never had do to the "can you hear me" thing" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47909739)) - Polished, enjoyable user experience (5 comments): "I prefer Zoom for that because I can hide most of the UI (and the other people) to focus on the teacher and their shared screen" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49844084)) "the giant arrow annotation Zoom has makes it worth any amount of money compared to the competition" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50019468)) "they have a product that is by far the most enjoyable to use in that space" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48286204)) - Better than Teams or Meet (3 comments): "Zoom will never lock up letting you join a meeting because someone decided you need to reauthenticate Teams regularly." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45934413)) "their products are usually worse than their competitors (e.g. GMeet vs Zoom)" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50279408)) "work as well or better than Teams for it's primary purpose: video calls" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45933769)) - Runs well on Linux/Wayland (3 comments): "apps, even proprietary ones like Zoom, tend to handle switching scale factors completely seamlessly" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46486697)) "Google Meet and Zoom screen sharing has always worked well in Wayland" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47453359)) "Even heavy applications like LibreOffice and Zoom are snappy." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46472460)) ## What people warn about - Privacy and security track record (6 comments): "They wouldn't do it "intentionally". It would be an mistake "accidentally" made by a Developer or AI, that under the right conditions allows Zoom employees, etc arbitrary file reads on the host" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46715979)) "After the COVID era bullshit of Zoom installing a utility that gives root access to anything, I've never installed it." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49378386)) "Zoom misled users by claiming “end-to-end, 256-bit encryption” when it actually provided a lower level of security" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48047158)) - Linux client invasive or broken (3 comments): "It works fine (tested on Arch), but at the very least you should run that kind of malware as a separate user" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47463734)) "I gave up on the native Zoom client on Linux right away, it was completely broken." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46878342)) "even if you don't click paste, zoom is actively listening to clipboard events and consuming pastes" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49678323)) - Web client limited, hard to find (3 comments): "The web client definitely lacks features, but I fail to see how this is a client feature?" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49688648)) "every once in a while, someone will ask me to screenshare on a shared monitor, then i will have to explain i cannot , because i am on zoom browser." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46715305)) "looking at your Zoom, which I uninstalled and use the web version, which is super hard to find now" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46682368)) - Inaccurate AI transcriptions (2 comments): "my last attempt at an ai-enabled zoom session was so wrong it got almost every identifying thing about me wrong" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49339470)) "I often review the transcriptions that zoom produces out of curiosity, and this happens constantly." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48435871)) ## Alternatives hackers recommend - [Jitsi Meet](https://hackerapproved.com/p/jitsi.md): 42 recommend - [Google Meet](https://hackerapproved.com/p/google-meet.md): 39 recommend - [Proton Meet](https://hackerapproved.com/p/proton-meet.md): 17 recommend - [Galene](https://hackerapproved.com/p/galene.md): 6 recommend - [Cisco Webex](https://hackerapproved.com/p/webex.md): 5 recommend ## Where to get it - [Visit the official site](https://www.zoom.com/) ## Cite as Hacker Approved, "Zoom", https://hackerapproved.com/p/zoom/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).