It's undeniable how much Valve's SteamOS has done for gaming on Linux. Since the Steam Deck came out, gaming-focused distros have popped up everywhere, but only a few of them have actually stayed the distance. Some of that is because SteamOS is going to have a wider release soon, and it doesn't make much sense to keep mirroring it anymore.

But two distros have stayed around. Bazzite is probably the best known, and takes an immutable approach to how the architecture is laid out. But I've been using another distro that took a different approach and I think it's actually better at what it does. That's Nobara, which is also based on Fedora, just the non-immutable version, and it's a labor of love by another big name in Linux gaming, GloriousEggroll, of Proton GE fame. Don't worry that it's only one person maintaining it; he often says that as long as he's alive and using Linux, Nobara will be around, because it was a custom distro he made for him and his father to use, so he's got a personal stake in it.

What is Nobara, and what makes it good?

It's Fedora, but not like you've ever seen it before

Nobara is a custom Linux distro based on Fedora, with notable tweaks that make it much easier for anyone to pick up and use. It's not only tweaked for gamers, although there's a healthy amount of gaming-centric apps installed by default. It's aimed at user-friendliness across the board, with all the proprietary packages included by default, whether that's multimedia codecs or graphics card drivers, so even casual users can install and get going without the usual added steps of terminal commands and adding proprietary repositories.

It's fast, it's pretty (using a customized version of KDE), has a ton of kernel patches so it's at home on new and old hardware and handhelds, and has the best of the GPU drivers available. Plus it's got all the things that make SteamOS great, like GameScope and Proton, and a ton of other gaming apps like mangohud, goverlay, and vkbasalt, which you'd typically need to find out how to install on your own.

The desktop environment is welcoming and polished, and you get Brave Browser, LibreOffice, InkScape, Steam, Wine, ProtonPlus, Lutris and more all prepackaged for your use. There are five different versions, although I have a particular preference for the Nobara spin on the KDE Plasma Desktop. You can also use GNOME, the normal KDE desktop, or versions customized to look like SteamOS but for HTPC or handheld use.

Better than Bazzite, really?

Let me just say I don't like how easy it is to break immutable distros

I've used almost every Linux desktop environment, compositor, package manager, and distro over the last couple of decades. While I appreciate that Bazzite is trying something new with Fedora Atomic Desktop, every time I install it, something goes wrong. This all has to do with one thing, the fact that some packages want you to use rpm-ostee, and the rest of Bazzite wants you to leave it the heck alone and use Flatpaks or Distrobox for everything. Install the wrong thing, and the supposedly immutable distro turns into a quivering jelly. Add in the fact immutable distros are relatively new, and trying to troubleshoot issues turns into a headache I'd rather not get.

But Nobara uses a traditional, mutable filesystem, which is how I've always used Linux and while I know that means I'm responsible for anything breaking, it also means I've got years of experience fixing those issues. You can install new software with RPM, Flatpak, or Snap, and tweak things to your liking by diving into the config files. That also means I can customize the desktop to my liking, although the default settings are one of the most stylish distros I've used and I haven't had to change anything yet.

The built-in custom Nobara Driver Manager can switch between GPU drivers easily, and includes mesa-vulkan and different branches of the Nvidia drivers, so you can find the ones that fit your GPU pretty easily. Certainly more easily than doing it manually, which has always been a problem for Nvidia users on Linux.

All of that means you're able to sign into Steam or other game managers via Lutris within minutes of installing Nobara, and the gaming performance is what you'd expect from a lower-overhead OS versus playing on Windows 11. It does have a few blockers that come with Linux gaming, mainly that most anti-cheat systems won't run, so the games that use them also won't work. That's primarily multiplayer games, so you probably want to stay on Windows if that's your thing, but for anything else you'll get more performance out of Nobara.

Nobara is my favorite Linux distro for gaming on the desktop

Soon enough, the Valve Steam Machine will release and SteamOS will have its moment on the desktop, but if you're waiting, you're missing out. Nobara looks great, runs just as well as it looks, and, crucially, has Nvidia drivers and other proprietary software that Valve doesn't include in SteamOS. It's my favorite Linux distro right now, whether you're gaming or not, and I'll be using it long after the Steam Machine is here.