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I've seen a lot of people who quite dislike Manjaro, and I'm not really sure why. I'm myself am not a Manjaro user, but I did use it for quite a while and enjoyed my experienced, as it felt almost ready out of the box. I'm not here to judge, just wanted to hear the opinion of the community on the matter. Thanks!
Opinion you said?... https://manjarno.snorlax.sh/
Thankfully the Manjaro team didn't seem to have a major mess-up recently, but they did have some very troubled past. Especially now that Arch has a real installer that bundles entire DEs for you, the premise of using an "Arch Linux but easy to use" OS seems less and less
To each their own though! Nothing wrong with using Manjaro at all if someone really likes it
It seems alright but I've seen a lot of issues.
Back when I contributed to ALMA - we'd constantly get issues created by Manjaro users, as it wouldn't work due to Manjaro having the kernel package set up differently IIRC.
I'd just use Arch Linux tbh, it's only painful the first time.
I’d just use Arch Linux tbh, it’s only painful the first time.
Makes sense. There's nothing wrong with vanilla Arch. But may I ask, why should someone use vanilla Arch instead of Arch based like Endevour? Not judging or anything, I'm just not sure if there are any advantages for using vanilla Arch?
Endeavour can also have similar issues due to packaging differences, but it's much rarer. i.e. only these ones are maintained separately - https://github.com/endeavouros-team/PKGBUILDS
But in general it can make getting support a bit harder, that's why I like using more popular distros.
Endavour or arch doesn't really make a difference imo, endavour uses the exact arch repos and only has an extra repo with stuff like AUR helpers, pre-configured DEs and a special script for properly setting up nvidia-dkms drivers.
The main benefit of using/installing arch at least once is that you'll learn quite a bit about the workings of the system. I did a manual arch install a few times and these days I usually just install endavour for the sensible defaults and pre installed QoL packages that I'm too lazy to search for and install on arch.
Manjaro is what got me into Arch so I'll always have a soft spot for it. I don't keep up with internet drama so much but I do remember people saying some stuff about the devs being shady/shitty. But I'm not sure how much truth there is to that.
Manjaro is what happens when you have a really nice installer for arch linux and some neat extras; but it's made by people who looked at a 20 minute youtube tutorial about the subject and think they're now the best in their subject even though they barely know how to refresh their own domain name.
if you want an arch-like experience use something like XeroxLinux, arco linux, or EndeavourOS instead, they all have their own place in the arch space and are way better at teaching you how to actually use and maintain your system rather than throw some system at it that will break because it is barely maintained and arch is a rolling release distro.
Brodie Robertson on youtube did a series of videos on the different fuckups by the manjaro team ranging from not refreshing their domain name, DDOS-ing the AUR with their tooling, and pushing broken patches upstream with a rat's ass of knowledge of what's actually going on.
Too many instances of poor management, and the 2 week package delay issue.
Doesn’t seem to be a good reason to use it when Endeavour exists.
Exactly. I have not looked back since changing to EndeavourOs!
I heard that the maintainers let some important web certificates expire, which is a big no-no.
Doesn't really affect most end-users in a practical way. But I get it, that slippery slope.
I've been using it for nearly 3 years and encountered minimal issues. I'm using it on a Lenovo E14 all AMD laptop, mostly for gaming and web browsing.
I just switched from Manjaro to endeavor OS. The AUR was just too useful and consistently breaking with Manjaro. The distro overall was fine outside of those issues. But I'm definitely liking endeavor OS a little more. And not just for the AUR. The Manjaro team has had a bit of drama It seems going on inside. They left their domains and certificates laps multiple times. It's definitely not confidence inspiring. But if you only use Manjaro and their repositories it's a pretty decent time.
I hardly ever use AUR, just the Manjaro repositories and flatpaks, so that may explain why I missed most of the headaches.
May I ask what DE are you using? Just curious to see what DE other people uses on Manjaro.
I'm using XFCE. It has been my choice for many years. It is simple, unobtrusive, light on resources.
Manjaro was my intro to Linux, but now that I know more about it, I can't recommend it in good conscience. Letting their SSL certs expire is something that happens (even though they could automate it), but telling their users to change their clocks so it works is a big no-no.
Worse than that is how they manage packages from upstream. Simply freezing them for two weeks is, in my opinion, the worst of both worlds. You don't get timely security updates, but you still end up with the issues of being on the bleeding edge - just late. It also means that if you use the AUR (which is really one of the biggest perks of Arch-based systems), it's possible that the necessary dependencies are out of date.
I think that if one wants "Arch with an installer" they should go with EndeavourOS, or try the archinstall script.
Simply freezing them for two weeks
That's not what they're doing at all. That dumb myth needs to die.
I've been using Manjaro for years and find it to be a solid distro to do your daily stuff. Running it with KDE on Wayland and its super smooth. Pretty much keep it up to date often and use pamac to update instead of pacman and things tend to go well.
I have heard things previously about Manjaro that make me want to avoid it.
OTOH, as an Arch user, some of the things I feel could use improvement are better with Manjaro. Pretty much every Arch derivative does something about the major pain points of Arch, though, slapping on a installation gui (though, honestly, just advertising the archinstall CLI script that's on the install usb stick and fixing it up a bit would help Arch), and giving you an AUR helper by default.
I recently tried the XFCE version of Endeavor in a vm, and I quite like it, so if I move from Arch, I'm more inclined to go that direction.
Arch would be so much better if it just automated the setup process to resemble that of most other mainstream distros.
Manjaro was the first Linux distro I used as a daily driver, from October 2020 to July 2021, when I switched to EndeavourOS. To be fair the main reason I switched was all those previous mess-ups by the developers and the troubled past, which I didn't know of when I moved to Linux. In the year or so I used it, I didn't have any messed update or crash myself.
I would say it's still a fine distro for beginners who want to try a rolling release (as EndeavourOS is imho better in every way, but it doesn't come with any GUI package manager so I wouldn't call it a distro for absolute beginners), but can't see any other usage case, as it's especially risky if you want to use packages from the AUR.
It is ultimately your choice, but from the many instances of poor communication, carelessness or whatever it was, I can't personally recommend it.
Even from a new user viewpoint they are often not helpful, reverting to rtfm, something that is expected on base arch, but not on something that supposedly wants to be preinstalled on hardware.
I wish them the best and hope that the ship eventually sails without hiccups.
It's fine. Sometimes an update breaks the stuff installed via aur, that's fixable by issuing a command like that:
yay -S $(pacman -Qoq /usr/lib/python3.11) --answerclean All
Otherwise it works rocksolid. I've got it for 2 years on my thinkpad and no issues. Are there better Arch like distros? Probably. Would I choose another distro like Endeavour OS when I have to make fresh install? Probably. But until then, its okay.
As good as Arch but with a little more hand-holding. Graphical installation, package manager in tray out of the box and not the most bleeding edge versions.
At home, where it's ok to once a year spend some time googling what went wrong and I'd be installing from command line anyway (my $HOME remembers a few other distros and is very fragmented), I use Arch.
For mom's, grandma's and work computers, where I want to just hit update and be done, I use Manjaro.
I enjoy Manjaro and I would even say its the reason I switched to linux (I didn't like the other distros) but I've had updates that brick my operating system however this isnt so much of a problem for me now since i back up my data and use timeshift now.
I think most of the Manjaro hate comes from people comparing it to arch linux
I heard some security issues with it, can't confirm.
I tried it on bare metal some years ago. The main issue I had was that it wasn’t very stable and I kept running into bugs that made the system hard to use. I’m sure they have fixed that by now but that was my experience.
It has no meaningful place or benefits and everyone defending it seems to just be saying "erm, well why not!" and ignoring the problems its caused when compared to distros like endeavouros
This. It feels like they occupy this weird space between stable and rolling releases that doesn't really accomplish much. Add on the issues (technical and ethical) over the years, and Manjaro occupies a strange place. Especially as EndeavourOS and even the arch-install script have evolved, it doesn't quite hold the "arch on easy-mode" vibe it used to.
Mostly negative. My experience using the distro was very short and quiet some time ago. I found it very buggy and unpolished, and it ended up broken by itself on both my desktop and laptop. I wanted to switch to a more bleeding edge distro after spending 9 years with Debian. After that I found a new home with Fedora.
I'm also (was)? a manjaro user, and so would like to know the answer. Maybe people just liked the higher barrier of entry for Arch?
I liked it but I had issues with changing versions of libraries for development. Sometimes I couldn't run older versions of some code so I had to go back to Debian.
I used it for a while. It's actually not that bad, but they made some really unprofessional blunders in the past and interacting with their main contributors is not very pleasant in my personal experience.
In the end it is mostly just Arch for noobs and it shows.
Manjaro had a rough history of not taking security seriously. I hope they have improved, but the impression stuck.
They have done a few things right by making Arch more approachable when Arch was more of a RTFM type distribution. Now Arch is easier and even ships with an installer, but Manjaro's installer is easy.
The end result is still that the user still needs to manage an Arch distro. I would recommend learning the Arch way from Arch instead of taking the easy road.
If you want an easy distro, rolling releases, and up-to-date packages, I would recommend Debian Did over Manjaro. If you want Arch, use Arch.
It all depends, it's not just the installer which makes it different than Arch, also the configurations (on Arch/Artix for many things to work, or safe configs, you actually need to do a lot of tweaks, whereas I understand Manjaro should work mostly out of the box with sane configs that should work in most regular users). As someone mentioned, for people not used to dealing with configurations, starting their experience with gnu+linux, perhaps Manjaro is the option, and then they can explore Arch/Artix.
I see some people say Manjaro has no place--to just use Arch or some other easier to use distro. IMO the more linux distros the better. I think many believe that more distros means its harder to get support, but using linux is also about being resourceful, and many things other distro communities have solved can be utilized in other distros.
Innovations that Manjaro makes can have an impact on their upstream, and the linux community as a whole. It fills a niche that might get someone to use linux that otherwise wouldn't. At the end of the day what helps out all of the linux community is the number of users.
@IUsedTo Recently migrated from Manjaro > Arch > NixOS.
I enjoyed Manjaro! Ignoring some of the issues outlined in other resources (one in this thread) which are completely valid, I think its a good way to get involved in the arch/arch-based space. I felt it was very easy to setup and get running. Most of the software support seemed pretty great and it was relatively snappy. I had no issues during my time (although I didn't need to use the AUR) and would definitely recommend it to others considering it.
I've been running it on my primary machine for over 5 years and it's still going strong, not something I was able to say about Ubuntu.
Also, enable the aur in the main package and you can install anything you want from GitHub straight through the package manager, it's magical
It's pretty good, basically Arch with training wheels. I find I prefer Fedora though.
I like the idea and used Manjaro for a few years, but its run by less competent people than Id like (or at least in comparison to other distros), so I stopped and moved to a different distro.
Ive started out on linux as a Manjaro user, and I still think it's a great beginner distro, pamac (add/remove software app) being one of the most useful things which im glad it came preinstalled.
But there are great frustrations about using the aur as half of the packages wont build, so I dont think it will give new users a good arch experience at all as they are just so annoying, new users should opt for endeavour instead of manjaro.
Also I dont think i would the manjaro team to not screw up things and cause issues such as shipping a broken kernal or whatever they do after the lastest drama, so I dont think I will ever get back to it when there are better arch based distros
(currently i run vanilla arch)
I don't know. I don't feel right if not arch like something missing