A couple years ago, I dipped my toe with switching partially and then fully from Windows 10 Pro to Fedora. I really love the experience and the smoothness of Fedora compared to Win10 and I did my best to explore the OS, learn some console commands, figuring out how to install stuff since not every app can be installed easily out of the box, etc.
I was and still am using NVIDIA and remember having to tinker with the display settings too because of wayland? Can’t remember precisely anymore, but a friend told me it’s generally easier to use AMD with Linux.
I mostly use my PC for gaming and since many games I played back then needed tinkering just to make it work (I used SteamProton), I gave up in the end and switched back to Win10 (now Win11 Pro).
In general, I’m curious about 2 things:
I wonder how the experience for gaming in Linux nowadays? For example, does it still require a lot of tinkering?
Is it in general worth it to move to using Linux if your main purpose for owning a PC is simply gaming, if so, what distro would you recommend or do you have any guide/website that I can rely on? Usually, aside from gaming, I’m also browsing gaming-related stuff on the side with Discord and Spotify.
Gaming on linux has been steadily improving in recent years. These days, it seems almost all steam games work on the latest version of proton. There are many other good tools for running windows games on linux, such as lutris and heroic launcher. But if you want the simplest “just works” experience, steam provides that.
I can’t comment on nvidia support, due to my using AMD GPUs, but my impression is it’s pretty good these days. In fact, I think some linux gamers prefer it these days due to it offering better raytracing performance than the open source AMD drivers. I expect, in spite of progress, the nvidia proprietary drivers are still more prone to compatibility/stability issues than the AMD open source ones. If you want to run the steam gamescope session, you’ll need an AMD GPU, as its nvidia support seems limited.
The best linux gaming experience is had on gaming focused distros: bazzite, nobara, and cachyos (handheld edition). These come with all sorts of tweaks to make gaming work well out of the box.
While this is a significant development, let me remind you that NVIDIA’s transition to open-source is currently limited to the kernel modules. The driver’s userspace components remain proprietary, which means that full open-source integration, particularly for gaming applications, may still be some way off.
However, it’s important to note that this transition doesn’t apply to all NVIDIA GPUs. The open-source modules are mandatory for cutting-edge platforms like NVIDIA Grace Hopper or NVIDIA Blackwell. NVIDIA recommends switching to open-source modules for GPUs from the Turing, Ampere, Ada Lovelace, or Hopper architectures. Older GPUs from the Maxwell, Pascal, or Volta architectures will continue using the proprietary driver, as they’re incompatible with the open-source modules.
There is Bazzite, which is targeted at Gaming: https://bazzite.gg/. It seems to use Fedora (at first glance). I myself dual-boot for gaming: Windows 10 Home & a Debian derivative. This allows me to keep games all in one place and my important documents in the other. Yes there is Proton and Wine to get games to work, but is it worth the hassle for you to check protondb and to tweak settings each time? Maybe it is. For me it wasn’t, so I ended up dual booting. There is an increase in anti-cheat support on Linux as years go by, but there is still a lot more to go.
In short, gaming on Linux is improving massively. As an experiment, I just started installing my games on Linux back in October, while switching to the Windows parition if I needed.
Turns out, I never needed it. I haven’t used Windows since.
You will have to learn some things, but I do find it works for me.
AMD drivers have traditionally been considered best; however I run a 3000 series nvidia GPU with no problems. Nvidia has also made massive gains lately with driver support, though several features still don’t run well on Linux. But general computing and gaming works fine.
Some tips:
The best ‘Gaming’ distros are Pop-OS (Ubuntu based) and Nobara (Fedora based). Nobara is made by GloriousEggroll
-Get protonGE
-Use protonUP to easily update protonGE
-Use Lutris and or HeroicLauncher for GOG or launchers other than steam
-Use protonDB
ChrisTitus is also making a Linux tool to easily setup everything and tweak distros for gaming with a couple clicks. He is VERY good at what he does, so I look forward to seeing his results
What you can expect with a proper configuration (numbers from my experience):
-99% of DRM-free games run with almost no trouble
-95% of DRM single player games, run.
-60-70% of multiplayer games run. Indie MP titles almost always run well, AAA like valorent, not so much. Helldiver’s works well though.
Thanks all for the replies! Also @dumpster@Spiral8558 and @Breeze54, thanks for your distro recommendation. I checked out a couple of YT videos yesterday after dumpster first mentioned those distros since I’m not familiar with those.
Seems indeed those distros are mentioned a lot for gaming.
@Spiral8558 that was indeed my experience when I tried Fedora a couple of years ago, not to mention, there was always something going wrong with NVIDIA too. So I ended up going back to Win again.
Wdy think about EndeavourOS? Most likely I will try dual booting for now. As long as I play Destiny 2, unfortunately I can’t go full Linux
EndeavorOS (just like Arch Linux, which it’s based on) benefits from very up-to-date packages with minimal modifications. In my experience, gaming works quite well on Arch based systems. The main downside is, like Arch, it doesn’t automatically install recommended packages (like Fedora does), so you may want/need to look into getting dependencies installed.
For a few years now, I have been gaming on Fedora/Linux since 2018. Its been a mix of mostly single player game, a few AAA games including Baldurs Gate 3 and Armored Core 6 and some online coop games, heck, even Minecraft Java.
Everything changed when I purchased racing wheels from Thrustmaster (T300RS wheelbase Servo) I chose it because, ehem, it isnt Logitech (I hate their mouse full of planned obsolescence). And it is supposed to be supported at the kernel level.. Overdrive didnt really help.
While input works, technically, there is no force feedback and the wheel persistently recenters. It is pretty much unusable in the context I want it to work at. In retrospect, maybe the natively available to Linux Logitech G Pro Racing Wheel might have a better Linux experience. But it may be too late for me to change - I have already reimaged the old Win11 gaming image I used to have. I hate it to death but it runs on Steam Big Picture mode and it has HDR.
I dont really care for online competitive multillayer so anticheat has no effect on me. Funny enough, not even anticheat is enough to stem the dark tide of cheaters that has me permanently sworn off most if not all competitive online games.
Also the amount of nonsense I’m seeing on this thread is shocking: just use the latest version of Proton via Lutris/Steam (for Steam, that’s under compatibility settings), and everything is pretty much one click and play (check protondb or look for “Steam Deck verified” on Steam’s listing of game(s) in question).
You don’t need to use a distro like Nobara (which breaks SELinux) or some other which tries to pander to gamers, just install the Steam flatpak. I recommend OpenSUSE Aeon as a distro (aeondesktop.org), because it’s: 1.) extremely stable, an immutable rolling-release with snapshots that are easy to revert if something breaks; 2.) no customization needed for gaming apart from doing what I mentioned.
As for hardware, team red (AMD, or Rysen/Radeon) all day for future hardware, zero setup and native functionality for all Linux distros (thanks to the Linux kernal).
For me personally, I have no interest in multiplayer games (singles player open-world RPGs are where it’s at), but as a rule, so long as it doesn’t have DRM, it probably works, or will work in the near future (see my previous advice).
Is it worth the switch? YES! I built my PC for gaming and installed Windows 10 initially, moved to dualboot setup, then switched exclusively to Linux and have never looked back. When I bought a laptop for gaming (and uni/professional work), I purged Windows immediately (both the desktop & laptop were Rysen/Radeon builds, zero problems with drivers) and have gamed exclusively on Linux since 2021.
If you have questions after this, visit the AeonDesktop subreddit, or Aeon Matrix/Telegram/Discord (they’re bridged, so it doesn’t matter which), the lead dev for Aeon is u/brownsuse or Richard Brown and he or someelse using NVIDIA hardware will answer!
I have switched from windows 10 pro to linux and started with zorin and switch to fedora after that and now i am with silverblue
And i recommend switching to linux this actually makes sense now you can’t ignore the fact that in last 4years linux gaming and overall linux operating system improved drastically.
I really like the experience it is kind of indistinguishable with windows
But make sure your games steam games supports in my case only 1 game is not playable.
Now choosing the distro is a big deal
If you go with fedora or silverblue it is slightly hard.
For other distros like ubuntu or opensuse don’t need to do much as all codec and stuff baked in.
Still you will not feel with fedora if choose all flatpak.
And there are some really good distros that has arrived
Nobara project
Ublue bluefilm bazaite.
I never encountered any such issue as of now i have switched 4years ago. On all my systems.
It really depends on what games you want to play. I have a dual boot system with ubuntu and windows 10. Typically I only need to use the windows drive for fortnite and the occasional very new multiplayer games with anticheat software. As others have said, use protondb to help determine whether a steam game will work well on linux. Occasionally you may have to do some tinkering but that’s pretty rare in my experience, and people will have suggestions on protondb for what modifications to make if needed.
I have an AMD card (5700XT) which I bought largely because I heard they play nicer with linux, and I have been very happy with it. Can’t comment on Nvidia much, but I’ve heard that Pop!_OS has very good support for Nvidia. It’s also just a great OS otherwise, so that may be something to try.
My only other suggestion is if you use steam a lot, it’s generally easier to use ubuntu or a derivative (like pop os) because the official steam package is for ubuntu. Any problems you encounter will be more searchable online and easier to resolve.
Thanks for your perspective. Seems like you implied that you use your machine for gaming but also work/uni, correct? If so, it makes sense that Linux may provide a lot more values when it comes to privacy.
With me on NVIDIA and still actively playing multiplaying game, these are the biggest hurdle for me to switch completely + the fact that I use my PC purely for gaming.
As I’m typing this, in the grand scheme of things, perhaps it’s best if I just stick to Windows, especially if MS just “knows” my gaming behavior + the tinkering that is involved just to make it work.
