Linux Mint: The Easiest Landing from Windows

Linux Mint is Ubuntu with the parts most newcomers dislike taken out and the parts they need put in. It is built on Ubuntu LTS, so the underlying system and every Ubuntu tutorial apply — but the desktop is familiar, the media codecs are already there, and nothing is installed as a snap.

It is the most common recommendation for someone leaving Windows, and unlike a lot of common recommendations it holds up.

What it changes

Three of those rows are the whole argument.

Cinnamon behaves the way a Windows user expects. A menu in the bottom-left, a taskbar of open windows, a system tray, windows that minimise. GNOME is a coherent and well-made design that deliberately does none of those things, and asking someone to relearn their desktop and their operating system at once is a lot. Mint removes one of the two.

No snaps, enforced. Mint does not merely omit snapd — it configures apt to refuse to install it, so the Ubuntu behaviour where apt install quietly gives you a snap cannot happen. Firefox comes as a normal deb from Mozilla’s repository and starts instantly. If the snap section of the Ubuntu page is why you were hesitating, this is the distribution that answers it.

Timeshift is set up on first boot. The welcome screen walks you through configuring system snapshots, so a bad update or a broken driver is undone by restoring rather than reinstalling. Very few distributions make this the default path for a new user, and it is the single most valuable thing Mint does for someone who does not yet know how to fix things.

The three editions

All three are the same system underneath, and switching later means installing a package rather than reinstalling. On anything from the last decade, Cinnamon is fine — reach for Xfce below about 4 GB of RAM.

The release cadence, and why it is slow on purpose

Mint tracks Ubuntu LTS, so a new base arrives every two years with point releases in between. The current series is 22.x, built on Ubuntu 24.04; Mint 23 moves to the Ubuntu 26.04 base and the project pushed its release back to the end of 2026 rather than ship it early.

That delay is characteristic and it is the correct instinct for this audience. A distribution recommended to people who cannot yet debug their own system should not be the first to ship a new desktop stack. The cost is that Mint is often a year or more behind on desktop software.

# Which release, and which Ubuntu base?
cat /etc/linuxmint/info
lsb_release -a

# Ordinary updates - or use the Update Manager
sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade

# Move to the next point release (22.1 to 22.2, etc.)
mintupgrade

Point releases within a series are routine. Moving between major versions is a bigger step, and Mint’s own advice is worth following: back up with Timeshift first, and consider a fresh install, which on a desktop with a separate /home is not the ordeal it sounds like.

LMDE

Linux Mint Debian Edition is the same desktop built on Debian rather than Ubuntu. It exists as insurance — if Ubuntu ever became an unsuitable base, the project could move — and it is a perfectly good system in its own right.

Use the normal edition unless you specifically want Debian underneath. LMDE lacks some Ubuntu-specific conveniences, notably the driver manager that installs proprietary graphics drivers for you, and less third-party software targets it.

Things that catch people out

Two of those have the same answer and it is worth stating: Update Manager can install a newer kernel without leaving the release, which fixes most “my wifi does not work” and “my laptop is too new” problems. It lives under View → Linux Kernels, and it lets you go back if the new one misbehaves.

For current desktop applications on an old base, Flatpak is the intended answer and it is already installed — the Software Manager offers Flatpak versions alongside deb ones. That combination, an old stable base with new applications on top, is the same arrangement recommended on the Debian page.

Who should run Mint

Yes, if this is someone’s first Linux desktop, and especially if they are arriving from Windows. Everything works, the interface is legible, the codecs are present, updates are managed by something friendly, and snapshots are configured before anything can go wrong. It is also a good choice for a machine you are setting up for someone else to use, since it needs very little explaining.

Also yes if you want Ubuntu’s hardware support and package availability but do not want snaps, and would rather not spend an evening removing them.

Look elsewhere if:

• It is a server. Mint is a desktop distribution and there is no reason to run it on one — use Debian, Ubuntu Server, or Rocky or Alma.
• You have very new hardware and would rather not manage kernels manually — Fedora ships recent kernels as a matter of course.
• You want current desktop software throughout rather than in two-year jumps — Fedora, or Arch if you will maintain it.
• You are learning Linux deliberately rather than using it. Mint’s polish means you fix fewer things, which is the point, and fixing things is how people learn.
• Your work targets Red Hat systems — the tooling is entirely different.

Quick reference

Related reading

• Ubuntu — the base, and the snap argument in full
• Debian — what LMDE is built on
• Fedora — newer software and better new-hardware support
• Command line basics — the terminal is still there when you want it
• Package management — apt, which Mint uses unchanged
• Filesystems — and why Timeshift on Btrfs is quicker