Linux on the desktop has had a renaissance of sorts in the last couple of years. Between all the legwork Valve has done to make gaming viable on the platform and the plethora of software options enhancing the quality-of-life, Linux is a very real option as an OS people can use day-to-day.

And yet, there are many people who try Linux only to switch right back to Windows. This isn’t because Linux is broken, unusable, or inherently worse. In fact, most beginners don’t leave after a single catastrophic failure. They leave because of a slow accumulation of small frustrations, each one minor on its own, but exhausting when stacked together.

Small hardware issues pile up

They can be quite disruptive

For most beginners, Linux actually starts off strong. The installer runs, Wi-Fi connects, the desktop loads, and everything seems fine. The problem is what happens after that honeymoon phase: a fingerprint reader doesn’t work, the function keys behave oddly, bluetooth audio reconnects inconsistently, sleep mode drains the battery overnight, external monitors wake up in the wrong order; you get the idea.

None of these issues are showstoppers, and many of them have fixes, but that’s part of the problem. The average Joe doesn't really want to spend their time fixing small issues. It could take 5 minutes or 50 minutes, and that gamble simply isn't worth taking when you're just trying to get work done. They'll ignore the issue until 10 of them pile up, and the straw to break the camel's back could be something as small as a missing context menu option, the fix for which is a single command.

Choosing the wrong distro

Take stock of all potential options

While distro certainly isn't everything when it comes to Linux, it plays a huge part in a newcomer's first impressions. While something like Arch may sound cool on paper, one can very easily be in over their head once they find out that their audio drivers are completely missing.

It starts with being honest with yourself. Most beginners don't need something as flexible and customizable as Arch, but instead would be much better suited to something like Fedora Silverblue, an atomic distro with immutability, or maybe Linux Mint, a distro with a ton of overlap with Windows.

Choosing the wrong desktop environment

Sometimes can be more important than choosing a distro

Something that will shape a beginners experience more than distro choice is desktop environment. There are so many to choose from, and some distros support many different ones out of the box. GNOME is a good choice for those who want a macOS-like experience, while KDE environments are better suited to those coming directly from Windows, but sometimes neither of the big two will provide what a user really wants. Most of the time, this is due to default behaviors, which any experienced Linux user knows are easily tweaked and changed. This level of friction is just not something that the beginner is willing to do, and it's no wonder why. Both Windows and macOS are both usable out of the box with very little tweaking needed, and if they are at 90% upon first boot, most Linux desktop environments probably land around 85%. That extra 5% is massive for a beginner, and can often be the difference between a successful swap and crawling back to Microsoft.

Software availability is good, but it still has some friction

You may need to be a bit flexible

Linux software availability has improved enormously, but the friction hasn’t disappeared, it’s just decreased. Most beginners can find alternatives for what they need, but the process often involves compromises they didn’t anticipate. A familiar app exists, but behaves slightly differently. Some may require extra permissions they didn't anticipate or know how to configure, and some tools only exist as web apps. Others are available, but through unfamiliar packaging systems, of which a new user won't fully know how to navigate.

A specific game that doesn't work

Anti-cheat and DRM can be impossible to get around

Gaming on Linux is better than ever, right up until it isn’t. Many beginners come in after hearing that “Linux gaming is basically solved now,” and in a broad sense, that’s definitely more true than it is false. But all it takes is one game that refuses to launch, one anti-cheat update that breaks compatibility, or one launcher behaving inconsistently to derail the experience. For players with a large library, it’s rarely a total failure. Most games work. That makes the exceptions even more frustrating.

In my experience, the games I primarily enjoy require third-party anti-cheats that won't work on Linux, and for the few that did work, I had problems with performance and crashing that has me keeping around a Windows machine, at least in the interim.

Falling back to Windows is a safe play

Eventually, many beginners reach a breaking point, and that's not because Linux is unusable, but rather, it's because Windows is familiar. Above all else, falling back to Windows is not admitting defeat, but it's a pragmatic decision for most. Their hardware behaves predictably, all the software and games work without checking compatibility layers, and they're able to get their work done without needing to fix something every day. Once Linux is set up well for a beginner, though, it can be an incredibly rewarding and refreshing experience.