{"slug": "bspwm", "name": "bspwm", "category": "os", "category_name": "Operating systems and desktop", "description": "", "recommenders": 1, "commenters": 3, "warners": 0, "score": 0.743, "rising": -0.33, "first": "2025-11-14", "latest": "2026-03-15", "why": "For graphical programs I prefer using a simple window manager like bspwm on X, and niri on Wayland.", "why_is_quote": true, "has_verdict": false, "sentiment": {"recommend": 1, "neutral": 4, "compare": 0, "warn": 0}, "spark": [0, 0, 1, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0], "listed": false, "loved": [], "caveat": "", "short_quote": "For graphical programs I prefer using a simple window manager like bspwm on X, and niri on Wayland.", "icon": false, "domain": null, "github_repo": null, "official_url": "", "pricing": "", "aliases": ["bspwm", "BSPWM"], "verdict": null, "praise": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 745306112, "item_id": 46581632, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46581632", "by": "imiric", "date": "2026-01-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "For graphical programs I prefer using a simple window manager like bspwm on X, and niri on Wayland.", "excerpt": "Cars have similar UX issues as well. See the whole touchscreen saga. It's also an issue on Linux, to an extent. GNOME has a tendency of forcing UIs on users, and Ubuntu with Unity, now GNOME again, etc. Though, thankfully, since the user is free to choose their own desktop environment and window manager, it's not as pressing of an issue. I realized many years ago that simpler UIs deliver the best UX. This is a large ", "context": "command line user", "use_case": "tiling window manager on X", "switched_from": "", "story": "The struggle of resizing windows on macOS Tahoe"}]}], "caveats": [], "who": [{"by": "imiric", "context": "Linux user, formerly bspwm user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47391780", "date": "2026-03-15"}], "tags": [], "use_cases": ["window manager", "window management on x11", "tiling window manager on x", "tiling window manager"], "compared": [{"slug": "niri", "name": "niri", "co": 3, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 1}, {"slug": "qtile", "name": "Qtile", "co": 1, "switched_from": 1, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47388137", "title": "Separating the Wayland Compositor and Window Manager", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46579864", "title": "The struggle of resizing windows on macOS Tahoe", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46105897", "title": "Xlibre is a fork of the Xorg Xserver with lots of code cleanups", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46002138", "title": "The Qtile Window Manager: A Python-Powered Tiling Experience", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45928873", "title": "Moving Back to a Tiling WM \u2013 XMonad", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {"neutral": 2}, "2025-12": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-01": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-02": {}, "2026-03": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-04": {}, "2026-05": {}, "2026-06": {}, "2026-07": {}, "2026-08": {}, "2026-09": {}, "2026-10": {}}, "quotes": [{"id": 758268482, "item_id": 47391780, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47391780", "by": "imiric", "date": "2026-03-15", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "It reminds me of the philosophy of bspwm/sxhkd which I used for years on X11.", "excerpt": "I'm very excited about river. I switched to niri a few months ago, and while I like it for the most part, it feels too... busy for my taste. It defaults to a bunch of animations and decorations, all of which I've turned off. I'm happy with my current setup (aside from Wayland quirks[1]), but river's design and simplicity are very appealing. It reminds me of the philosophy of bspwm/sxhkd which I used for years on X11.", "context": "Linux user, formerly bspwm user", "use_case": "window management on X11", "switched_from": "", "story": "Separating the Wayland Compositor and Window Manager"}, {"id": 745306112, "item_id": 46581632, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46581632", "by": "imiric", "date": "2026-01-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "For graphical programs I prefer using a simple window manager like bspwm on X, and niri on Wayland.", "excerpt": "Cars have similar UX issues as well. See the whole touchscreen saga. It's also an issue on Linux, to an extent. GNOME has a tendency of forcing UIs on users, and Ubuntu with Unity, now GNOME again, etc. Though, thankfully, since the user is free to choose their own desktop environment and window manager, it's not as pressing of an issue. I realized many years ago that simpler UIs deliver the best UX. This is a large ", "context": "command line user", "use_case": "tiling window manager on X", "switched_from": "", "story": "The struggle of resizing windows on macOS Tahoe"}, {"id": 737697296, "item_id": 46106081, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46106081", "by": "d-lisp", "date": "2025-12-01", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I haven't switched to wayland yet, and still use BSPWM", "excerpt": "> Together we'll make X great again! But isn't the problem of X a problem of responsabilities breadth ? I.e. a philosophical problem rather than a \"implementation\" one ? (For my part I haven't switched to wayland yet, and still use BSPWM)", "context": "", "use_case": "window manager", "switched_from": "", "story": "Xlibre is a fork of the Xorg Xserver with lots of code cleanups"}, {"id": 736215793, "item_id": 46013487, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46013487", "by": "imiric", "date": "2025-11-22", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "moved on to bspwm, and now niri", "excerpt": "It's great to see Qtile still going strong. I used it briefly many moons ago, and enjoyed how easy it was to extend, given it is configured with Python. Sadly, I experienced crashes, which soured the experience, and moved on to bspwm, and now niri.", "context": "", "use_case": "window manager", "switched_from": "Qtile", "story": "The Qtile Window Manager: A Python-Powered Tiling Experience"}, {"id": 734870081, "item_id": 45929380, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45929380", "by": "Der_Einzige", "date": "2025-11-14", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "it had really nice I3, bspwm, and xmonad distributions.", "excerpt": "The only reason I used manjaro and thus arch was that it had really nice I3, bspwm, and xmonad distributions. It's very fun to rice a setup and make something worthy of posting on r/linuxporn.", "context": "", "use_case": "tiling window manager", "switched_from": "", "story": "Moving Back to a Tiling WM \u2013 XMonad"}]}