Is Ubuntu Still The Most Popular Linux Distro?

For the past few years, Ubuntu has been considered the most popular Linux distribution. Recently, there has been a flurry of blog posts claiming that Linux Mint is now more popular than Ubuntu. While Linux Mint seems to have gained greatly in popularity since the first release in 2006, all meaningful statistics (if there is such a thing) point to Ubuntu’s clear lead in usage and popularity.

It’s nearly impossible to tell how many people are using any given Linux distribution. Each distro probably has some internal statistics that they can use to judge relative popularity, but tracking how many people have installed a distro or use it regularly (let alone how much they “like it”) is currently not possible. We can, however look at some general trends online to get an idea of a distro’s relative popularity.

Please Note: this article is in no way a scientific study of distro popularity, it is just a bunch of interesting statistics from around the internet.

Let’s look at some online sources that can give us an idea of the relative popularity of different Linux distros.

DistroWatch.com

DistroWatch.com's most popular Linux distributions for the past 6 months

Linux Mint Ubuntu Fedora openSUSE Debian Arch PCLinuxOS CentOS Puppy Mandriva

Website popularity

Ubuntu clearly holds the lead in website popularity, but Linux Mint, Debian and CentOS are not far behind.

Blogging Trends

Google Trends

First, let’s compare the top 4 distros from DistroWatch.com. As you can see, Ubuntu is searched for far more often than Linux Mint, Debian and openSUSE.

Now, compare Ubuntu to the rest of the top 10 distros combined. Ubuntu is searched for more often than all the other distros together! However, you can also see a gradual decline in Ubuntu searches over the past couple of years.

Another interesting trend appears when you compare Ubuntu with Linux. At certain times (around new releases), Ubuntu is actually searched for more often than Linux. Does this mean that Ubuntu as an operating system or distro is becoming more popular amongst the general population than Linux?

Twitter

Facebook Shares

Ubuntu - 83,945 shares Linux Mint - 7,762 shares Fedora - 6,313 shares Debian - 3,986 shares Arch - 1,445 shares CentOS - 979 shares openSUSE - 599 shares PCLinuxOS - 573 shares Puppy - 426 shares Mandriva - 419 shares

Conclusion

What does this mean for the future of Linux distributions? Are users really leaving Ubuntu because of the Unity interface (like many would claim)? Is Linux Mint the distro of the future?

Personally, I think that the competition between the different distros and desktop environments only strengthens the Linux community. Offerings from Linux Mint, openSUSE and Fedora bring their own unique ideas to the Linux world. If Canonical is wise, they will pay attention to these trends, to the latest developments in other Linux distros and use that input to build a better Ubuntu.