Debian
The rock-solid foundation many other distros are built on, with a new stable release roughly every two years.
Best for: Anyone who values stability above all and doesn't need the newest software.
- Base
- Independent
- Package manager
- apt
- Release model
- fixed
- Difficulty
- intermediate
- Desktops
- GNOME, KDE Plasma, Xfce, Others
Pros
- Extremely stable
- Five-year lifecycle: three years of full support plus two of LTS
- Huge package repository
- Very low maintenance
Worth knowing
- Software is older
- Gaming and new hardware can need extra work
Try Debian before you install it
Download the official image from www.debian.org, write it to a USB stick with a tool such as balenaEtcher or Ventoy, restart, and pick the USB stick from your boot menu. Choose the “try” option and nothing on your computer changes.
Last verified October 28, 2026 (high confidence). Official Debian pages confirm the 5-year lifecycle and the current stable release. Desktop list is general knowledge, not checked against the installer.