Ever wished you could play Factorio while being unburdened of the additional stress of a desktop environment? Where the only notifications you get are the ones reminding you to build, build, and build some more? Well, now you can with FactoriOS, a bespoke Linux distribution that does one thing, and one thing only — run Factorio.

I know, it sounded like a fever dream to me as well. I mean, I'm not a huge fan of games that make me do hard labor, but when I started thinking about it as a puzzle to be solved I got pretty hooked. What I really appreciate is anything that removes the friction and gets me gaming quicker, and this amusing distro does that well.

Wait, this has to be a joke?

Sure, but that doesn't make it any less cool

FactoriOS is built on Arch, which is a good building block if you want a minimal operating system to begin with. Pop in the ISO from the builds page and the shell installer wipes your hard drive, so you can build factories unencumbered by the distractions of modern life.

No, we mean that, it will wipe your hard drive, so only run the installer on a device you want to dedicate to factories. Or inside a VM, that will be dedicated to factories, which is where I've got it installed. I know that's not full dedication to the bit, but the rest of that virtualization platform is full of other machines, so it's a factory of its own.

You will need a Factorio license from the website, because the only thing waiting for you once FactoriOS boots is a basic GUI to download the game and log in with your website credentials. That's it, and it takes longer to download the latest build of the game than it takes to install the OS.

FactoriOS is fantastic

Who needs containers when you can pare back an OS

If building and maintaining factories from the ground up is your jam, I can't think of a better way than using this distro. And it's clear I'm not alone, as the game has sold over 5 million copies on Steam alone since its 2020 release. There's even a DLC that brings you into the Space Age, taking your industrious demeanor to new worlds (that you can strip mine and industrialize, of course) once you've completed the base game's end goal of building a rocket .

Sure, you could play the Steam app, but where's the fun in that? Show your dedication to the amazing world of industry by running it as the only thing that runs on a mini PC or laptop. You won't have time to answer email anyway, you have factories to manage and defend. And trains. Never forget there are trains. We like trains.

Custom Linux distros are part of the point

If it doesn't already exist, make it so!

Open source software is there to be tinkered with, and not everyone likes the defaults that the major distributions ship with. Even the more niche Linux distros might not be what you're after, but with a little learning and work, you could make your own. Or nowadays, get an LLM to do the heavy lifting for you, and end up with an operating system that fits your needs.

You might want something for serving files across your network instead of a desktop environment. Or a lighter operating system to run on a portable gaming handheld, because we all know Windows is a resource hog. Or any number of specialized configurations for running local LLMs or deeper AI development.

If you still prefer the feel of the Windows desktop, there are distros such as Zorin or AnduinOS which have the familiar feel but are built around the Linux kernel instead. Just be aware that the more niche distros are likely to have slower release schedules, or limited support as an end user if you run into problems.

You don't even need to dual-boot or wipe your device to use Linux anymore. Distrobox lets you run your OS of choice as a container, or you could use WSL2 if you're still running Windows. Proxmox also lets you manage multiple operating systems as virtual machines, as if you had a fleet of devices plugged in.

FactoriOS is just the tip of the iceberg

There are so many Linux distributions to choose from, whether maintained by large companies or by a single developer. The hard part is figuring out which things matter to you as a user, so you can decide which distro is right for daily use. Maybe that's something gaming-focused, like Nobara or Bazzite, or CachyOS. You might value stability and support, in which case, Ubuntu or Fedora would be the best bets. FactoriOS just underscores that there is probably a distro for your desires, even if that only desire is to play Factorio. And never forget the trains.