GNOME. Been using Linux since before GNOME Shell was a thing and when it became a thing it just clicked for me. In my opinion, it’s by far the most polished DE and provides the most elegant and intuitive launcher and workspace switcher of any DE or OS I’ve used. At least they did, until they fucked it up by moving from vertical to horizontal workspaces and made the workspace previews so small you can no longer see what’s in them.
Which is the downside of GNOME. Sometimes their developers are their own worst enemies. Fortunately, there are usually extensions to fix the most egregious “enhancements”.
KDE. I used to use Gnome but switched over to KDE a few years ago.
KDE Plasma
had to scroll way too much…
Kde
GNOME. I love the ecosystem of apps and the great design and simplicity, even if I sacrifice customization and features.
GNOME is designers trying to develop a DE
KDE is developers trying to design a DE.
Gnome without extensions. It gets out of the way and let’s me work. Whenever I have to use something else, it feels like going backwards in time. I used to love tinkering with my system and tried a lot of DE’s back in the days. Don’t have the time for that anymore.
I did have to adjust though. I think that a lot of the hate gnome gets is because of this. If you espect it to work like a traditional desktop you’re going to get frustrated and install too many extensions to make it like one. My advise would be to set aside your presumptions and try it like it’s meant to be used. You might be surprised, I know I was…
A while ago I found this video, which explains it in more detail.
I’m usually an XFCE guy but I’m giving Cinnamon a whirl at the moment
i3
Hyprland for me.
Uh-oh.
Why uh-oh?
There is some controversy related to hyprland developers. You can look it up.
Gnome with some extentions
GNOME, works well enough.