Currently running fedora, because it is stable, easy to use and just works. Also, gnome is imo the best designed major, full-featured desktop environment that exists out there (even including windows or macos).

You might get a more tailored experience with window managers but im currently to lazy to set that up. I did use dwm for a time though, but it wasnt really flexible enough for me.

I used to use windows but recently I installed Linux Mint to see how Linux works and to get more performance for gaming from my thinkpad.

Void Linux. It was the OS that made me stop distro hopping

Will I get jumped if I say MacOS?

I'm just kidding, but I do like MacOS. I just find it more aesthetically pleasing than Windows and I find it easier to use and longer lasting than Windows. Like, I had to use my 2014 MacBook Air with 4GB of RAM for a week because I needed to repair my main Mac. Yes, it was slow, I couldn't have too many apps running at the same time, and I couldn't have my customary 20 tabs open, but it was certainly usable and not too frustrating.

Debian Linux. Because it just works.

Runner-up: Mac OS. Same reason as above, but not free, so it’s #2.

Second-runner up: Free DOS because why not?

Distant last place: Windows, cause occasionally you need to call in your retarded cousin who is the only one that can do that one thing just right.

Nobody in here talking about BeOS, QDos, Geos (like windows for the C64!), AIX, or OS2 Warp? For shame!

QNX fucking rocked, I wish it had been useable as a day-to-day system. If I had to pick one it would be that sighs wistfully

My answer isn’t unique, but Arch linux is just my favorite to use. I just really love the ability to assemble things exactly the way I like them during the installation process.

I also really like the idea of a rolling release distro, meaning no major upgrades. I just run pacman -Syu once a day and things have been great.

Lastly, almost any piece of software I could want is available in the official repositories or the AUR, and it’s super convenient to be able to install things right away from the command line.

Editing to add: My work laptop is a MacBook Pro and I love it. macOS is really pleasant to use and anyone who says it’s not is a liar. Apple’s user experience game is on point

Daily driving OpenBSD for 1 year and 8 months now. The simplicity of it and its sane defaults make it much easier to configure than the Linux distros I've used in the past, and it has been more reliable than FreeBSD on my main system. On my X230, It Just Works™.

I'm mainly privacy and security focused when it comes to software. My first Linux distro was Whonix. It's like if Tor expanded from the browser into an OS. Its a bit clunky and outdated though, so not a great daily driver. My second and current distro was the KDE spin of Fedora. It's been amazing top to bottom. Unfortunately Red Hat recently started some drama, but Fedora shouldn't be impacted as its upstream. If Red Hat's greasy paws do mess things up, I'm thinking about running OpenSUSE Tumbleweed. Hopefully it's just me over thinking and Fedora will remain a stellar OS option for years to come.

Between Linux Mint for its reliability and ease of use and Gentoo for just being really nice to use overall with a ton of the control linux is well known for.

Fedora and Debian. It just works, can't complain. Need to use windows 11 on a notebook, absolutely hate it.

I'm glad you asked. How much time do you have?

Pop os

Ubuntu compatibility without any canonical garbage

Works and works well

Out of the box ready for most use cases

Competent engineers and support

I've been using Unix in one form or another since the mid 80s, so that's pretty deeply ingrained by now.

I was strongly biased towards Solaris & OpenBSD for many years (Solaris on nice Sun hardware, OpenBSD on small machines) but both began to annoy me a little bit recently, so I switched to Void linux. (Also, there was ONE feature of Linux that I REALLY wanted - extended attributes (name=val) in the filesystem. Love those.)

I'm fascinated by Multics & Control Data's NOS (70s mainframe OS's), but that's for historic study, not actual use.

macOS for personal use, Rocky Linux or Ubuntu for my servers

Love how most of the responses are different distros of Linux.

1998:

Me: I’d rather be running Linux

Systems Manager: Linux is a day late and a dollar short. Novell is the future. Microsoft might be interesting too.

She went off to teach community college after she got laid off.

I don't have a favorite. Every OS has its pros and cons, so it's "right to for the right job" situation for me.

I run Windows 10/11 on my desktops because some piece of software requires it (trust me, I've looked at alternatives.) unRAID on one server, and Ubuntu on a couple of other servers. They all have quirks that I absolutely hate, but there's no such thing as perfect operating system.

RISC OS. It's quite unique, and the UI design is great. Want to save a file? Drag this icon where you want to save it. Access the menu? Middle button, oh and it's all context sensitive, directly under the pointer. Applications are just directories - there are no hidden files.

Windows. Everything is straight forward and I can still make some custom or niche stuff work.

I don't like Linux, because a lot of programs don't work, and I don't want to create my own 3D application or DAW from scratch. Not worth my time.

I don't like Apple because the money I'd put into that I'd rather put to better use.

I use arch btw.

Gives me the flexibility to do what I want and contrary to the internet I haven't managed to break everything. I managed to break Ubuntu through

I've always used Windows as my main OS, but I have experience with Macs as school computers, and now I'm exploring Linux. I gotta say Linux is probably my favorite. It's so configurable and my workflow is so smooth now that when I try and use my Windows laptop instead I find myself trying to use keybinds from my WM lol. I miss my terminal! WSL is just not the same. I have to have Windows on my school laptop, and I still have it on my PC. My hope is that I can switch my PC to Linux when Win10 loses support. Hopefully Nvidia will play nice. But I do prefer Windows over Mac simply cause I've used it longer. I've only ever used Macs on a surface level, never had my own or was able to tweak settings and such. So idk I might feel differently if I had one. But I'm definitely liking Linux a lot more cause of the customization and no update badgering lol

What? No love for ElementaryOS? It runs really well on my Pinebook Pro.

manjaro kde + bismuth for tiling