Criticism of desktop Linux is a history of comment on the perceived shortcomings of the Linux operating system when installed on desktop computers. These criticisms have been aimed at the plethora of issues and lack of consistency between Linux distributions, their usefulness and ease of use as desktop systems for general end users, driver support and issues with multi-media playback and audio development.
While smartphones running the Linux-based Android mobile operating system dominate the smartphone market, and Linux is used on most servers, as of 2021 exclusively run on the world's 500 fastest supercomputers, and is used on the New York Stock Exchange, Linux-based operating systems have failed to achieve widespread adoption on personal computers.
Viability of Linux as a desktop system
Linus Torvalds has expressed that he intended the Linux kernel to be used in desktop operating systems. He argues that Android is widely used because it comes pre-installed on new phones, and that Linux distributions would need to be bundled on new computers to gain market share.
Linux has been criticized for a number of reasons, including lack of user-friendliness and having a steep learning curve, being inadequate for desktop use, lacking support for some hardware, having a relatively small games library, lacking native versions of widely used applications.
Some critics do not believe Linux will ever gain a large share in the desktop market. In May 2009 Preston Gralla, contributing editor to Computerworld.com, believed that Linux would never be important to desktop/notebook users, even though he felt it was simple and straightforward to use, but that its low usage was indicative of its low importance in the desktop market.
In his essay Luxury of Ignorance: An Open-Source Horror Story, Eric S. Raymond stated that the lack of usability in many open-source and Linux tools is not from lack of manuals but from a lack of thought about the users' experience.
James Donald from Princeton University analyzed shared library concepts of several operating systems. In his 2003 paper titled Improved Portability of Shared Libraries, he worried about the lack of a Windows Application Compatibility Group equivalent.
Missed opportunities
Desktop Linux was criticized in late 2010 for having missed its opportunity to become a significant force in desktop computing. PC World executive editor Robert Strohmeyer commented that although Linux has exceptional security and stability, as well as great performance and usability, the time for desktop Linux to succeed has been missed. Nick Farrell, writing for TechEye, felt that the release of the poorly-received Windows Vista was a missed opportunity to grab significant market share.
Both critics indicated that Linux did not fail on the desktop due to being "too geeky," "too hard to use," or "too obscure". Both had praise for distributions, Strohmeyer saying "the best-known distribution, Ubuntu, has received high marks for usability from every major player in the technology press". Both laid the blame for this failure on the open-source community. Strohmeyer named the "fierce ideology of the open-source community at large" as being responsible, while Farrell stated "The biggest killer of putting penguin software on the desktop was the Linux community. If you think the Apple fanboys are completely barking, they are role models of sanity to the loudmouthed Open Sauce religious loonies who are out there. Like many fundamentalists they are totally inflexible — waving a GNU as if it were handed down by God to Richard Stallman".
The accusation of over-zealous advocacy has been dealt with previously; in 2006 Dominic Humphries stated that the aims of the Linux community are not desktop market-share or popularity, but in Linux being the best operating system that can be made for the community.
Criticisms
Choice and fragmentation
A criticism often leveled against Linux is the abundance of distributions available. As of July 2023, DistroWatch lists 250 active distributions. Critics cite the large number as cause for confusion to prospective users and argue it is a factor preventing the widespread adoption of Linux on consumer desktops. Alexander Wolfe wrote in InformationWeek: