The Linux Resources Mega Thread

Articles & Guides Desktop & Apps
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A community-maintained wiki of the best Linux sites, blogs, forums, tools, and learning resources worth bookmarking.

This is a wiki post which means any trust level 1+ member can edit it directly and add to it. If you’ve got a great resource that’s missing, add it in the right section.

Stick to actively maintained or well-established resources that you’d genuinely recommend to a friend. Short one-line description with each entry helps people know what they’re clicking.

This is meant to grow over time. Treat it as the front door for anyone arriving here looking for Linux stuff.

Major Linux news, magazines, and general blogs

  • Phoronix — Linux hardware reviews, kernel news, benchmarks, and graphics driver coverage
  • LWN.net — in-depth weekly Linux kernel and free software journalism, the gold standard for serious technical coverage
  • It’s FOSS — beginner-friendly Linux news, tutorials, and software recommendations
  • OMG! Ubuntu — Ubuntu and GNOME-focused news and tutorials
  • 9to5Linux — daily Linux news covering distro releases, kernel updates, and open source software
  • Linux Magazine — long-running print and digital magazine with tutorials and deep dives
  • The Register - Software — tech news with strong Linux and open source coverage
  • Ars Technica - Open Source — quality long-form Linux and open source journalism
  • Linux Today — news aggregator covering the broader Linux ecosystem
  • DistroWatch — distro release tracking, news, and the famous (and often misunderstood) page hit rankings
  • Hacker News — not Linux-specific but heavy with Linux, infrastructure, and open source discussion
  • Linux.com — Linux Foundation’s news and tutorial site
  • LinuxBlog.io — long-running Linux and tech blog covering server optimization, sysadmin commands, hosting, and home lab topics (this community’s sister site)

Linux community forums and discussion

Distribution-specific forums and wikis

Debian and derivatives

Arch and derivatives

Fedora, Red Hat, openSUSE

Other major distros

Desktop environments and window managers

  • GNOME — official GNOME project site
  • KDE — official KDE Plasma and applications site
  • KDE Forums — official KDE community
  • Xfce — official Xfce project
  • Cinnamon — Linux Mint’s flagship DE
  • MATE Desktop — official MATE project
  • LXQt — lightweight Qt desktop
  • Budgie Desktop — Budgie DE project
  • COSMIC — System76’s new Rust-based DE
  • Hyprland — tiling Wayland compositor with eye-candy and animations
  • Sway — i3-compatible Wayland tiling compositor
  • i3wm — classic tiling window manager
  • Awesome WM — highly configurable framework window manager
  • bspwm — tiling WM driven by external messages
  • dwm — suckless dynamic window manager

Linux desktop customization

  • r/unixporn — biggest customization showcase community
  • Pling — themes, icons, wallpapers, widgets for Linux desktops
  • GNOME Extensions — official GNOME shell extensions
  • KDE Store — themes, plasmoids, and add-ons for KDE
  • Linux Mint Themes — Cinnamon spices repository
  • Polybar — fast and modular status bar
  • Waybar — highly customizable Wayland bar
  • Rofi — application launcher and dmenu replacement
  • Wallhaven — large curated wallpaper repository

Terminals, shells, and CLI tools

  • Alacritty — fast GPU-accelerated terminal emulator
  • Kitty — feature-rich GPU-accelerated terminal
  • WezTerm — Lua-configurable cross-platform terminal
  • Ghostty — newer fast, native, cross-platform terminal
  • tmux — terminal multiplexer
  • Zellij — modern terminal workspace and multiplexer
  • Zsh — popular Bash alternative shell
  • Fish — user-friendly shell with smart autosuggestions
  • Oh My Zsh — popular Zsh configuration framework
  • Starship — minimal, blazing-fast shell prompt
  • fzf — command-line fuzzy finder
  • ripgrep — fast recursive grep alternative
  • bat — cat replacement with syntax highlighting
  • eza — modern ls replacement
  • zoxide — smarter cd that learns your habits
  • tldr — community-driven simplified man pages
  • Neovim — modern Vim fork
  • Vim — classic text editor
  • GNU Emacs — extensible text editor
  • Helix — post-modern modal editor in Rust

System monitoring and performance tools

  • htop — interactive process viewer
  • btop — resource monitor with modern UI
  • Glances — cross-platform monitoring tool
  • bottom — Rust-based system monitor
  • iotop — disk I/O monitoring
  • iftop — bandwidth usage on an interface
  • Netdata — real-time performance and health monitoring
  • Prometheus — open source metrics and alerting toolkit
  • Grafana — open source observability dashboards

Package managers and software repositories

  • Flathub — main Flatpak app repository, the dominant cross-distro app source
  • Snapcraft — Canonical’s Snap store
  • AppImageHub — directory of portable AppImage applications
  • Arch User Repository (AUR) — user-contributed Arch packages
  • Homebrew — works on Linux too, useful for getting newer versions of CLI tools

Development and programming

Self-hosting and home lab

Containers, orchestration, and DevOps

Security, privacy, and pentesting

  • Kali Linux — pentesting distribution
  • Parrot OS — security and privacy-focused distro
  • Whonix — anonymity-focused OS routing all traffic through Tor
  • Tails — amnesic live OS for privacy
  • Qubes OS — security through compartmentalization
  • Privacy Guides — privacy-focused tools and recommendations
  • HackTricks — pentesting techniques and notes
  • OWASP — open web application security project
  • Exploit Database — archive of exploits and proof-of-concept code
  • r/netsec — technical security subreddit

Gaming on Linux

  • ProtonDB — community reports on which games work on Linux via Proton
  • Steam for Linux — Valve’s Linux client with Proton compatibility layer
  • Lutris — open source gaming platform managing native, Wine, and emulated games
  • Bottles — easy Wine prefix management
  • WineHQ — official Wine compatibility layer
  • GamingOnLinux — Linux gaming news and reviews
  • Heroic Games Launcher — Epic, GOG, and Amazon games on Linux
  • r/linux_gaming — Linux gaming community

Linux laptops and hardware

Learning Linux

YouTube channels

Podcasts

Chat and real-time communities

  • Libera.Chat — IRC network that hosts most major FOSS project channels.
  • OFTC — IRC network used by Debian and other projects
  • Matrix.org — federated chat protocol with bridges to IRC and Discord
  • Element — main Matrix client
  • Discord — many distros and projects have official Discord servers (check the project’s site)

Wikis and reference

Tools, utilities, and notable applications

  • Firefox — open source web browser
  • Thunderbird — Mozilla’s email client
  • LibreOffice — free office suite
  • GIMP — image editor
  • Krita — digital painting application
  • Inkscape — vector graphics editor
  • Blender — 3D creation suite
  • Kdenlive — video editor
  • OBS Studio — screen recording and live streaming
  • Audacity — audio editor
  • VLC — media player that plays anything
  • VS Code — Microsoft’s editor (also see VSCodium for the libre build)
  • Syncthing — continuous file synchronization
  • KeePassXC — open source password manager
  • Bitwarden — open source cloud password manager
  • Signal — encrypted messenger
  • Joplin — open source note-taking
  • Obsidian — markdown knowledge base (proprietary but popular)
  • Logseq — open source outliner and knowledge base
  • Czkawka — fast duplicate finder and cleanup tool
  • Timeshift — system snapshot and restore

Foundations and advocacy

Newsletters and aggregators

If you’ve made it this far, this is a wiki post — click the edit icon and add what’s missing. Keep entries focused on actively maintained, reputable, or genuinely useful resources. One-line description with each link.

Have a resource you’re not sure where to add? Drop it in a reply and someone will slot it in.

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My 2 cents

You could add:

and

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Thanks! Feel free to edit the original post above. This is a wiki post which can be edited by all members.

Hit the image icon.

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