{"slug": "aurora", "name": "Aurora", "category": "os", "category_name": "Operating systems and desktop", "description": "", "recommenders": 3, "commenters": 6, "warners": 1, "score": 2.16, "rising": 0.35, "first": "2025-11-30", "latest": "2026-08-28", "why": "there are awesome distros like Bazzite and Aurora that are rock-solid like MacOS and ChromeOS", "why_is_quote": true, "has_verdict": false, "sentiment": {"recommend": 3, "neutral": 2, "compare": 0, "warn": 1}, "spark": [1, 1, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0, 0], "listed": true, "loved": [], "caveat": "", "short_quote": "there are awesome distros like Bazzite and Aurora that are rock-solid like MacOS and ChromeOS", "icon": false, "domain": null, "github_repo": null, "official_url": "https://getaurora.dev", "pricing": "", "aliases": ["Aurora"], "verdict": null, "praise": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 791607025, "item_id": 49475439, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49475439", "by": "blizdiddy", "date": "2026-08-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "as a happy Aurora user", "excerpt": "Flatpak is great for installing, but as a happy Aurora user, it\u2019s annoying and it breaks things all the time. Every desktop app i use has some broken feature. Sandboxes as another permissions panel suck. Simple browser-like permissions that allow prompted overwrite would be WAY better! Now i have media organizer programs that deletes my files if i try to write on a networked drive. Games that can\u2019t see the controller", "context": "", "use_case": "desktop OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "Sovereign Tech Agency invests \u20ac500k in Flatpak"}, {"id": 738788800, "item_id": 46174300, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46174300", "by": "goekhanski", "date": "2025-12-06", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love the automatic updates", "excerpt": "I've been using this for roughly a year on my work machine. I love the automatic updates: flatpak, brew and the system image get updated automatically. Usually once a week I get the stable update. I don't have to care because it's just a reboot (same for major updates, e.g. Fedora 42 -> 43). I love this. I had to do some workarounds, but not too much. I mostly work with Firefox, kubectl, k9s, helix and occasionally V", "context": "", "use_case": "work machine", "switched_from": "", "story": "Aurora: The Linux-based ultimate workstation"}, {"id": 737596594, "item_id": 46099787, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46099787", "by": "jjaksic", "date": "2025-11-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "there are awesome distros like Bazzite and Aurora that are rock-solid like MacOS and ChromeOS", "excerpt": "Bazzite is an insanely awesome distro! I used Ubuntu for 8 years constantly fixing issues, from the day I installed it (because it didn't support basic Ryzen), after every distro upgrade, and various other random points, e.g. when installing a package whose dependency overwrote something. Each issue took hours to fix, usually searching forums for arcane command lines and trying everything until something worked (poss", "context": "", "use_case": "desktop OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "Bazzite: Operating System for Linux gaming"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 790871984, "item_id": 49429499, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49429499", "by": "mikae1", "date": "2026-08-25", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Been using Aurora (Universal Blue) for years, but there's always a package or two you need to layer. Updates have crapped out more than once because of these packages.", "excerpt": "> Vanilla OS is built on Debian sid Tuxedo settled for Testing. Reason for Sid? > Additionally, with Vib (Vanilla Image Builder), anyone can customize their own system image, or even create their own distro with minimal effort. This sounds very intriguing! Been using Aurora (Universal Blue) for years, but there's always a package or two you need to layer. Updates have crapped out more than once because of these packa", "context": "", "use_case": "immutable desktop OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Vanilla OS 3 Reunion \u2013 Immutable and Reproducible Operating System"}]}], "who": [{"by": "wolvoleo", "context": "de-Googles Android devices", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48958466", "date": "2026-07-18"}], "tags": [], "use_cases": ["desktop os", "immutable desktop os", "installing android apps without google", "ai weather forecasting", "work machine"], "compared": [{"slug": "fedora", "name": "Fedora", "co": 1, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 1}, {"slug": "flatpak", "name": "Flatpak", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "bazzite", "name": "Bazzite", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49474786", "title": "Sovereign Tech Agency invests \u20ac500k in Flatpak", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49417684", "title": "Show HN: Vanilla OS 3 Reunion \u2013 Immutable and Reproducible Operating System", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48930397", "title": "Reynard: A real Firefox web browser for iOS 13 or later", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47098296", "title": "Acme Weather", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46094589", "title": "Aurora: The Linux-based ultimate workstation", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46091362", "title": "Bazzite: Operating System for Linux gaming", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {"recommend": 1}, "2025-12": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-01": {}, "2026-02": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-03": {}, "2026-04": {}, "2026-05": {}, "2026-06": {}, "2026-07": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-08": {"warn": 1, "recommend": 1}, "2026-09": {}, "2026-10": {}}, "quotes": [{"id": 791607025, "item_id": 49475439, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49475439", "by": "blizdiddy", "date": "2026-08-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "as a happy Aurora user", "excerpt": "Flatpak is great for installing, but as a happy Aurora user, it\u2019s annoying and it breaks things all the time. Every desktop app i use has some broken feature. Sandboxes as another permissions panel suck. Simple browser-like permissions that allow prompted overwrite would be WAY better! Now i have media organizer programs that deletes my files if i try to write on a networked drive. Games that can\u2019t see the controller", "context": "", "use_case": "desktop OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "Sovereign Tech Agency invests \u20ac500k in Flatpak"}, {"id": 790871984, "item_id": 49429499, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49429499", "by": "mikae1", "date": "2026-08-25", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Been using Aurora (Universal Blue) for years, but there's always a package or two you need to layer. Updates have crapped out more than once because of these packages.", "excerpt": "> Vanilla OS is built on Debian sid Tuxedo settled for Testing. Reason for Sid? > Additionally, with Vib (Vanilla Image Builder), anyone can customize their own system image, or even create their own distro with minimal effort. This sounds very intriguing! Been using Aurora (Universal Blue) for years, but there's always a package or two you need to layer. Updates have crapped out more than once because of these packa", "context": "", "use_case": "immutable desktop OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Vanilla OS 3 Reunion \u2013 Immutable and Reproducible Operating System"}, {"id": 783335456, "item_id": 48958466, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48958466", "by": "wolvoleo", "date": "2026-07-18", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I install my apps using Aurora and F-Droid.", "excerpt": "It's similar to what I do yes. I buy normal Android devices but I use ADB to get rid of most of the google stuff. In Google Play Services I just don't sign in and I disable all the data collection. It's not ideal but the problem is I really need the push service for work. And my devices are not supported by AOSP distros. I install my apps using Aurora and F-Droid.", "context": "de-Googles Android devices", "use_case": "installing Android apps without Google", "switched_from": "", "story": "Reynard: A real Firefox web browser for iOS 13 or later"}, {"id": 753776481, "item_id": 47111030, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47111030", "by": "i7l", "date": "2026-02-22", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "all have AI weather forecast models", "excerpt": "Google, Microsoft, Huawei, NVIDIA all have AI weather forecast models: https://deepmind.google/science/weathernext/ https://microsoft.github.io/aurora/intro.html https://www.huawei.com/en/news/2023/8/pangu-weather-forcast https://blogs.nvidia.com/blog/nvidia-earth-2-open-models/ A Swiss startup named Jua does this for energy markets. Disclosure: I used to work there.", "context": "", "use_case": "AI weather forecasting", "switched_from": "", "story": "Acme Weather"}, {"id": 738788800, "item_id": 46174300, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46174300", "by": "goekhanski", "date": "2025-12-06", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love the automatic updates", "excerpt": "I've been using this for roughly a year on my work machine. I love the automatic updates: flatpak, brew and the system image get updated automatically. Usually once a week I get the stable update. I don't have to care because it's just a reboot (same for major updates, e.g. Fedora 42 -> 43). I love this. I had to do some workarounds, but not too much. I mostly work with Firefox, kubectl, k9s, helix and occasionally V", "context": "", "use_case": "work machine", "switched_from": "", "story": "Aurora: The Linux-based ultimate workstation"}, {"id": 737596594, "item_id": 46099787, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46099787", "by": "jjaksic", "date": "2025-11-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "there are awesome distros like Bazzite and Aurora that are rock-solid like MacOS and ChromeOS", "excerpt": "Bazzite is an insanely awesome distro! I used Ubuntu for 8 years constantly fixing issues, from the day I installed it (because it didn't support basic Ryzen), after every distro upgrade, and various other random points, e.g. when installing a package whose dependency overwrote something. Each issue took hours to fix, usually searching forums for arcane command lines and trying everything until something worked (poss", "context": "", "use_case": "desktop OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "Bazzite: Operating System for Linux gaming"}]}