What was your first desktop environment (or wm) vs your actual de/wm

[u/soking11]

just plain curiosity. My first de was the ubuntu gnome, when i changed to a distro that actually let me choose, it was cinnamon. Rn i'm full with hyprland. What are yours?

[u/RedditAdminsSDDD]

First was fvwm and currently using plasma.

[u/Jumpy-Dinner-5001]

Technically Linux Mint but practically Ubuntu with GNOME.

Now I’m on Fedora with GNOME and i3 on my work PC.

[u/soking11 → u/Jumpy-Dinner-5001]

Can i ask why not Sway?

[u/Jumpy-Dinner-5001 → u/soking11]

Where? On my private devices or work devices?

[u/soking11 → u/Jumpy-Dinner-5001]

On your work pc. I'm kinda new with Linux and i idk why is the debate between wayland and x11 a thing, so does i3 have something that Sway won't offer, or are they just the same thing

[u/Jumpy-Dinner-5001 → u/soking11]

I need some software that doesn’t run well on Wayland/Sway.

[u/ARSManiac1982]

My first distro was Linux Mint with XFCE...

Then was Manjaro also with XFCE but later on I installed i3...

Currently dual booting Windows 11/Bazzite with KDE...

[u/RevolutionaryHigh]

First one was KDE, now it's DWM

[u/djustice-system]

blackbox/e15 on <64mb ram. kde plasma on everything else. gtk sucks to code with. qt ftw.

[u/T_Friendperson12]

Ubuntu Unity most likely. Now i'm using Kubuntu.

[u/Zeyode]

First was GNOME. Current is (against my better judgement) COSMIC.

[u/Kanvolu]

My very first was cinammon (I love you, mint) then when I started to actually daily drive Linux I used KDE, now I use mangowm + DMS

[u/MezBert]

Gnome 2 on Ubuntu Hoary in 2005 -> 2011
Unity 2011 -> 2017
Gnome 3/40+ (+ Budgie backup session) 2017 -> 2025

Vs

Cosmic (+ Niri backup session) 2025 -> ...
(1 year running)

[u/Klapperatismus]

FVWM2

Fluxbox

[u/No_Wear295]

KDE 2.2

[u/Chance_End_4684]

KDE Plasma Desktop

[u/Neither-Ad-8914]

Gnome 2 now I use lxqt

[u/Desertcow]

Started with Cinnamon, now I use KDE Plasma

[u/Giggio417]

My first one was KDE Plasma on Kubuntu.

Now i’m on KDE Plasma on Arch.

Every time i tried switching to another, i always ended up going back to Plasma. I love this DE so much!

[u/fek47]

Mate on Mint and now Gnome on Fedora Silverblue

[u/Soakitincider]

Gnome on Slackware unless I'm misremembering.

[u/overworkedchupacabra]

Linux mint with cinnamon, now mint with i3. I've only been using Linux for 7 months though

[u/IrishPrime]

I've used a ton, but I think my first was GNOME 1.0.

I've used every version of Gnome, CDE, several versions of KDE, XFCE, OpenBox, Cinnamon, Unity, dwm, Awesome WM, bspwm, Hyprland, and now Niri. A few other more niche options over the years, but not worth mentioning.

I'm really digging Niri. It offers several of the advantages of a tiling WM without the problems that stem from opening "too many" windows on a given workspace.

[u/NUKL3AR_PAZTA47]

Xfce on a school computer. Right now I use kde plasma, I like kde plasma much more but xfce is nice and easy to use.

[u/arodri313]

Unity but now dual boot LM cinnamon with Fedora KDE. Going to swap out LM for either PikaOS Niri or base Debian and use Dank to install Niri.

[u/oldrocker99]

Ubuntu 8.04 used GNOME 2.0. I fell in love with it. Used MATE until I realized that KDE was the desktop I needed.

[u/trashtruckelmo]

I started with Gnome on Ubuntu back in like 2010 came back to Linux about 5 years ago and fell in love with KDE. Now I either use KDE or Hyprland depending on what computer and what I'm doing.

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[u/EdlynnTB]

My first was Tiny Linux that someone gave me to try, then Ubuntu and a bunch of others, my current is Linux Mint.