{"slug": "nixos", "name": "NixOS", "category": "os", "category_name": "Operating systems and desktop", "description": "Linux distribution built on the Nix package manager with declarative, reproducible system configuration.", "recommenders": 80, "commenters": 107, "warners": 4, "score": 74.24, "rising": 13.65, "first": "2025-11-05", "latest": "2026-10-27", "why": "HN commenters like NixOS for its stability and reliable rollbacks to previous system snapshots, and for declarative configs that reproduce one setup across desktops, servers and homelabs.", "why_is_quote": false, "has_verdict": true, "sentiment": {"recommend": 82, "neutral": 28, "compare": 3, "warn": 4}, "spark": [1, 3, 8, 1, 12, 1, 1, 17, 9, 9, 11, 9], "listed": true, "loved": ["Stability, rollbacks", "Multi-machine config"], "caveat": "Learning curve", "short_quote": "I've been using NixOS for years and it's awesome. Total game changer for managing my PC and development environments.", "icon": true, "domain": "nixos.org", "github_repo": null, "official_url": "https://nixos.org", "pricing": "open source", "aliases": ["NixOS"], "verdict": [{"text": "HN commenters like NixOS for its stability and reliable rollbacks to previous system snapshots,", "cites": [{"id": 798325504, "item_id": 49895344, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49895344", "by": "erikw", "date": "2026-09-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've never had a failed rollback since using NixOS as my primary OS since around 2016", "excerpt": "I think it depends on what they want it for. I can imagine NixOS being perfect for user workstations for example, as an alternative to Windows workstations managed with Active Directory. I imagine you have a lot more experience than I do packaging for NixOS and other distros given your product, but in the few cases that I've needed to run a binary, I just wrap it with a flake and it's done. I also stay on NixOS stabl", "context": "desktop user since 2016", "use_case": "desktop OS and workstations", "switched_from": "", "story": "US sanctions force The Netherlands off Microsoft and toward alternative NixOS"}, {"id": 797482864, "item_id": 49842679, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49842679", "by": "tcfhgj", "date": "2026-09-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "So far I have broken every Linux distro I used except NixOS.", "excerpt": "So far I have broken every Linux distro I used except NixOS. And if I were to break it, i could just reboot into the previous system snapshot. And I haven't read 1000 pages of docs - from my experience id doubt it even has that many docs.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Dutch governments builds alternative for Microsoft based on NixOS"}, {"id": 797476720, "item_id": 49842295, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49842295", "by": "dminik", "date": "2026-09-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've yet to get a system that was as stable as it.", "excerpt": "Each nixos rebuild creates a snapshot. While I also eventually moved off of nixos, I've yet to get a system that was as stable as it.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Dutch governments builds alternative for Microsoft based on NixOS"}, {"id": 800646736, "item_id": 50040421, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50040421", "by": "chickensong", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "NixOS is a breath of fresh air and has reinvigorated my love of Linux.", "excerpt": "Nix daily driver for years here. I don't know what they did to screw up their system like that, but it's unusual IME. Normally you can just reboot and load the previous profile. Even in the absolute worst case, as long as you have your config, you could boot the installer and then load your config and your system comes back exactly as it was. It's definitely not beta software. FWIW, I used Debian more than anything o", "context": "Nix daily driver for years, Linux user", "use_case": "daily driver OS", "switched_from": "Debian", "story": "Nix wrote half of my debugger"}, {"id": 779874560, "item_id": 48742160, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48742160", "by": "pmarreck", "date": "2026-06-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Once you grok this, doing it any other way will seem insane.", "excerpt": "The entire system configuration is one file or a small set of files. If you copy it to a different machine, you can \"run\" it and get pretty much the same machine. If you screw up the config, the system tells you before it even tries to apply it. If something breaks while applying it (which is rare), NOTHING is broken because the entire system still points at the old instance, since cutover is atomic. This is already ", "context": "has bricked other Linux distros", "use_case": "reproducible daily-driver system", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS 26.05 Released"}]}, {"text": " and for declarative configs that reproduce one setup across desktops, servers and homelabs.", "cites": [{"id": 800691665, "item_id": 50043229, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50043229", "by": "hamburglar", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it\u2019s gone so well that I now use the same nix config to manage three different machines", "excerpt": "I used nix years ago on a Mac just as a sort of alternative to what I\u2019d otherwise use homebrew for and I really liked it, so I decided a few times that i would try nixos for my laptop. Each time I was stopped by the awful documentation and the weird \u201cflakes are experimental but kinda required\u201d state of the project and I gave up. This year I decided to give it another try and set it up on an ancient laptop using Claud", "context": "", "use_case": "laptop OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "Nix wrote half of my debugger"}, {"id": 800282682, "item_id": 50017667, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50017667", "by": "wraptile", "date": "2026-10-09", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Everything on nixos with config repo that configs all of my machines with claude code.", "excerpt": "These VPS no longer make much sense for self-hosting imo. I have two refurbished 32gb ram Lenovo k14 laptops (250$ each) that I use for self-hosting over tailscale and cloudflare tunnels. This is a lot of compute and very little power use. One for personal self-hosted projects: languagetool, nextcloud, hister, syncthing, restic backups, vaultwarden, windmill. Another for public facing web apps I host through cloudfla", "context": "", "use_case": "declarative machine config", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What do you run on a $5 VPS that's worth keeping online 24/7?"}, {"id": 779578865, "item_id": 48723679, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48723679", "by": "rhco", "date": "2026-06-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "NixOS makes sure the system itself is identical", "excerpt": "You could take this one step further using Syncthing to sync important data between the workstation and laptop. That's how my devices are configured, and it's amazing - if I need to travel for work, I just pick up my laptop and go. NixOS makes sure the system itself is identical (apps, most of the code configs, etc), then any app-spcific config is handled by Syncthing. It was really magical the first few times I used", "context": "", "use_case": "reproducible workstation and laptop", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS 26.05 Released"}, {"id": 779924688, "item_id": 48745293, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48745293", "by": "sunaurus", "date": "2026-07-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Switched to NixOS a few years ago, and I can't overstate the amount of peace it has brought to my life.", "excerpt": "I've been maintaining homelab servers for two decades, used all kinds of IaC approaches etc. Switched to NixOS a few years ago, and I can't overstate the amount of peace it has brought to my life. It just takes so much stress away, compared to everything else I've used before. My only criticism is that the Nix language is not super ergonomic or easy to learn. But with LLMs nowadays, even that is barely ever a problem", "context": "maintained homelab servers for two decades", "use_case": "homelab servers", "switched_from": "", "story": "I Don't Maintain My Homelab"}, {"id": 779915904, "item_id": 48744744, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48744744", "by": "kamov", "date": "2026-07-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "It's been normal for me for the past 3 years thanks to using NixOS for all server infrastructure.", "excerpt": "> I've approximated it somewhere around 15 minutes of maintenance per month, barring an emergency. If that's normal to you, congrats - you've peaked in life. However, that's absolutely absurd to me. I used to spend days on end building, maintaining, and debugging various aspects of my servers, databases, apps, etc. It's been normal for me for the past 3 years thanks to using NixOS for all server infrastructure.", "context": "", "use_case": "server infrastructure", "switched_from": "", "story": "I Don't Maintain My Homelab"}]}, {"text": " The most common complaint is the steep learning curve of the Nix language and its documentation,", "cites": [{"id": 779924688, "item_id": 48745293, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48745293", "by": "sunaurus", "date": "2026-07-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Switched to NixOS a few years ago, and I can't overstate the amount of peace it has brought to my life.", "excerpt": "I've been maintaining homelab servers for two decades, used all kinds of IaC approaches etc. Switched to NixOS a few years ago, and I can't overstate the amount of peace it has brought to my life. It just takes so much stress away, compared to everything else I've used before. My only criticism is that the Nix language is not super ergonomic or easy to learn. But with LLMs nowadays, even that is barely ever a problem", "context": "maintained homelab servers for two decades", "use_case": "homelab servers", "switched_from": "", "story": "I Don't Maintain My Homelab"}, {"id": 777536832, "item_id": 48596052, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48596052", "by": "lobofta", "date": "2026-06-19", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Try NixOs.", "excerpt": "Try NixOs. Somewhat of a steep learning curve, but once you're over the hump setting up a machine is about half an hour of work and most of that is just waiting for stuff to download. Set up a new machine the other day and it immediately became my daily driver as everything works nearly exactly as on my other machines.", "context": "", "use_case": "reproducible machine setup", "switched_from": "", "story": "Setting Up a New Windows Laptop in 2026"}, {"id": 779538496, "item_id": 48721156, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48721156", "by": "jon-wood", "date": "2026-06-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love the slightly weird learning curve on NixOS", "excerpt": "I love the slightly weird learning curve on NixOS where initially it seems incredibly complex writing this weird functional programming language for every change you want to apply to your system, then over time it clicks and you end up in a place where any operating system that doesn't define everything in a weird functional programming language seems incredibly complex. I read blog posts about doing things on other ", "context": "", "use_case": "declarative system configuration", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS 26.05 Released"}, {"id": 800691665, "item_id": 50043229, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50043229", "by": "hamburglar", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it\u2019s gone so well that I now use the same nix config to manage three different machines", "excerpt": "I used nix years ago on a Mac just as a sort of alternative to what I\u2019d otherwise use homebrew for and I really liked it, so I decided a few times that i would try nixos for my laptop. Each time I was stopped by the awful documentation and the weird \u201cflakes are experimental but kinda required\u201d state of the project and I gave up. This year I decided to give it another try and set it up on an ancient laptop using Claud", "context": "", "use_case": "laptop OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "Nix wrote half of my debugger"}]}, {"text": " though several say LLM assistants now make writing configs much easier.", "cites": [{"id": 785005936, "item_id": 49062871, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49062871", "by": "CatDadCode", "date": "2026-07-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "NixOS is definitely my preferred place to be now because the AI can maintain the declaration tree", "excerpt": "I've been driving NixOS with Codex and it's simply amazing. I used to regard Nix as a hobbyist thing that I couldn't bother with because it's tedious and complex even though the declarative nature of it is so cool. Now the tedious and complex parts are gone, leaving only the benefits. NixOS is definitely my preferred place to be now because the AI can maintain the declaration tree while me a monkey just say \"me want ", "context": "", "use_case": "declarative OS configuration with AI", "switched_from": "", "story": "Moonshine: Lets you stream games from your PC to any device running Moonlight"}, {"id": 779674272, "item_id": 48729642, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48729642", "by": "QuiCasseRien", "date": "2026-06-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I really use the power of nix/nixos since Codex is doing good code with it.", "excerpt": "> It seems anecdotally like LLMs have really given it a boost recently I have been using Nixos for the past 5 years. And I really use the power of nix/nixos since Codex is doing good code with it. Setup easily systemd-user unit with podman rootless, backup, writing script during build...", "context": "NixOS user for 5 years", "use_case": "system configuration", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS 26.05 Released"}, {"id": 779543968, "item_id": 48721498, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48721498", "by": "mplanchard", "date": "2026-06-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love seeing all these posts from NixOS newcomers!", "excerpt": "I love seeing all these posts from NixOS newcomers! It seems anecdotally like LLMs have really given it a boost recently, I guess by reducing the intimidation factor of the language and the unfamiliarity? Of all the positive and negative outcomes I have imagined from LLMs, NixOS becoming popular was not one of them, but I'll take it.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS 26.05 Released"}, {"id": 779538384, "item_id": 48721149, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48721149", "by": "chem83", "date": "2026-06-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "NixOS has been my daily driver since 2022/2023 and I have greatly improved the management of my 2 computers and few VMs since.", "excerpt": "NixOS has been my daily driver since 2022/2023 and I have greatly improved the management of my 2 computers and few VMs since. Because of LLMs, I now understand the language much better, but even if I didn't want to write Nix directly, describing the config to AI usually produces good results. The two main sticking points IMO are still: - Development environments are still a pain. devenv.sh is great for web and backe", "context": "manages 2 computers and a few VMs", "use_case": "daily driver OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS 26.05 Released"}]}], "praise": [{"label": "Stability, rollbacks", "summary": "Users say they cannot break it and can always boot back into a previous known-good configuration.", "quotes": [{"id": 797482864, "item_id": 49842679, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49842679", "by": "tcfhgj", "date": "2026-09-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "So far I have broken every Linux distro I used except NixOS.", "excerpt": "So far I have broken every Linux distro I used except NixOS. And if I were to break it, i could just reboot into the previous system snapshot. And I haven't read 1000 pages of docs - from my experience id doubt it even has that many docs.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Dutch governments builds alternative for Microsoft based on NixOS"}, {"id": 798325504, "item_id": 49895344, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49895344", "by": "erikw", "date": "2026-09-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've never had a failed rollback since using NixOS as my primary OS since around 2016", "excerpt": "I think it depends on what they want it for. I can imagine NixOS being perfect for user workstations for example, as an alternative to Windows workstations managed with Active Directory. I imagine you have a lot more experience than I do packaging for NixOS and other distros given your product, but in the few cases that I've needed to run a binary, I just wrap it with a flake and it's done. I also stay on NixOS stabl", "context": "desktop user since 2016", "use_case": "desktop OS and workstations", "switched_from": "", "story": "US sanctions force The Netherlands off Microsoft and toward alternative NixOS"}, {"id": 779874560, "item_id": 48742160, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48742160", "by": "pmarreck", "date": "2026-06-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Once you grok this, doing it any other way will seem insane.", "excerpt": "The entire system configuration is one file or a small set of files. If you copy it to a different machine, you can \"run\" it and get pretty much the same machine. If you screw up the config, the system tells you before it even tries to apply it. If something breaks while applying it (which is rare), NOTHING is broken because the entire system still points at the old instance, since cutover is atomic. This is already ", "context": "has bricked other Linux distros", "use_case": "reproducible daily-driver system", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS 26.05 Released"}]}, {"label": "Multi-machine config", "summary": "One declarative config repo sets up and keeps several machines identical.", "quotes": [{"id": 800691665, "item_id": 50043229, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50043229", "by": "hamburglar", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it\u2019s gone so well that I now use the same nix config to manage three different machines", "excerpt": "I used nix years ago on a Mac just as a sort of alternative to what I\u2019d otherwise use homebrew for and I really liked it, so I decided a few times that i would try nixos for my laptop. Each time I was stopped by the awful documentation and the weird \u201cflakes are experimental but kinda required\u201d state of the project and I gave up. This year I decided to give it another try and set it up on an ancient laptop using Claud", "context": "", "use_case": "laptop OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "Nix wrote half of my debugger"}, {"id": 779578865, "item_id": 48723679, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48723679", "by": "rhco", "date": "2026-06-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "NixOS makes sure the system itself is identical", "excerpt": "You could take this one step further using Syncthing to sync important data between the workstation and laptop. That's how my devices are configured, and it's amazing - if I need to travel for work, I just pick up my laptop and go. NixOS makes sure the system itself is identical (apps, most of the code configs, etc), then any app-spcific config is handled by Syncthing. It was really magical the first few times I used", "context": "", "use_case": "reproducible workstation and laptop", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS 26.05 Released"}, {"id": 777536832, "item_id": 48596052, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48596052", "by": "lobofta", "date": "2026-06-19", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Try NixOs.", "excerpt": "Try NixOs. Somewhat of a steep learning curve, but once you're over the hump setting up a machine is about half an hour of work and most of that is just waiting for stuff to download. Set up a new machine the other day and it immediately became my daily driver as everything works nearly exactly as on my other machines.", "context": "", "use_case": "reproducible machine setup", "switched_from": "", "story": "Setting Up a New Windows Laptop in 2026"}]}, {"label": "Servers and homelabs", "summary": "Self-hosters report far less maintenance and stress running servers on NixOS.", "quotes": [{"id": 779924688, "item_id": 48745293, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48745293", "by": "sunaurus", "date": "2026-07-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Switched to NixOS a few years ago, and I can't overstate the amount of peace it has brought to my life.", "excerpt": "I've been maintaining homelab servers for two decades, used all kinds of IaC approaches etc. Switched to NixOS a few years ago, and I can't overstate the amount of peace it has brought to my life. It just takes so much stress away, compared to everything else I've used before. My only criticism is that the Nix language is not super ergonomic or easy to learn. But with LLMs nowadays, even that is barely ever a problem", "context": "maintained homelab servers for two decades", "use_case": "homelab servers", "switched_from": "", "story": "I Don't Maintain My Homelab"}, {"id": 779915904, "item_id": 48744744, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48744744", "by": "kamov", "date": "2026-07-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "It's been normal for me for the past 3 years thanks to using NixOS for all server infrastructure.", "excerpt": "> I've approximated it somewhere around 15 minutes of maintenance per month, barring an emergency. If that's normal to you, congrats - you've peaked in life. However, that's absolutely absurd to me. I used to spend days on end building, maintaining, and debugging various aspects of my servers, databases, apps, etc. It's been normal for me for the past 3 years thanks to using NixOS for all server infrastructure.", "context": "", "use_case": "server infrastructure", "switched_from": "", "story": "I Don't Maintain My Homelab"}, {"id": 801847376, "item_id": 50115461, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50115461", "by": "attilaolah", "date": "2026-10-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Eventually I switched to Systemd only, Clan-managed NixOS instances on bare metal.", "excerpt": "I also used to run everything on K8s (hybrid Talos / Alpine+k0s on nodes too small for Talos). It is a fun exercise, but with many small nodes eventually I realised I was burning a quarter of my fleet's CPU on just monitoring and routing services. Eventually I switched to Systemd only, Clan-managed NixOS instances on bare metal. The killer feature for me is socket activation. It even works with Jellyfin, wrapped in s", "context": "self-hosts on many small nodes", "use_case": "homelab server OS", "switched_from": "Kubernetes", "story": "What I self-host"}]}, {"label": "Easier with LLMs", "summary": "AI assistants handle the tedious Nix code, leaving the declarative benefits.", "quotes": [{"id": 785005936, "item_id": 49062871, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49062871", "by": "CatDadCode", "date": "2026-07-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "NixOS is definitely my preferred place to be now because the AI can maintain the declaration tree", "excerpt": "I've been driving NixOS with Codex and it's simply amazing. I used to regard Nix as a hobbyist thing that I couldn't bother with because it's tedious and complex even though the declarative nature of it is so cool. Now the tedious and complex parts are gone, leaving only the benefits. NixOS is definitely my preferred place to be now because the AI can maintain the declaration tree while me a monkey just say \"me want ", "context": "", "use_case": "declarative OS configuration with AI", "switched_from": "", "story": "Moonshine: Lets you stream games from your PC to any device running Moonlight"}, {"id": 779674272, "item_id": 48729642, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48729642", "by": "QuiCasseRien", "date": "2026-06-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I really use the power of nix/nixos since Codex is doing good code with it.", "excerpt": "> It seems anecdotally like LLMs have really given it a boost recently I have been using Nixos for the past 5 years. And I really use the power of nix/nixos since Codex is doing good code with it. Setup easily systemd-user unit with podman rootless, backup, writing script during build...", "context": "NixOS user for 5 years", "use_case": "system configuration", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS 26.05 Released"}, {"id": 779543968, "item_id": 48721498, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48721498", "by": "mplanchard", "date": "2026-06-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love seeing all these posts from NixOS newcomers!", "excerpt": "I love seeing all these posts from NixOS newcomers! It seems anecdotally like LLMs have really given it a boost recently, I guess by reducing the intimidation factor of the language and the unfamiliarity? Of all the positive and negative outcomes I have imagined from LLMs, NixOS becoming popular was not one of them, but I'll take it.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS 26.05 Released"}]}, {"label": "Development work", "summary": "Commenters use it to manage development environments and daily software work.", "quotes": [{"id": 792046544, "item_id": 49502909, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49502909", "by": "toshinoriyagi", "date": "2026-08-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've been using NixOS for years and it's awesome. Total game changer for managing my PC and development environments.", "excerpt": "I don't think this is true. I've been using NixOS for years and it's awesome. Total game changer for managing my PC and development environments. More adoption will help of course, but I certainly haven't needed it to get tons of value from Nix.", "context": "", "use_case": "managing PC and dev environments", "switched_from": "", "story": "One Nix flake to rule them all"}, {"id": 802692000, "item_id": 50168250, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50168250", "by": "Nerdrotic", "date": "2026-10-20", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Where NixOS really shines is in solving software development problems.", "excerpt": "I've spent the last few years deep diving Nix / NixOS and I can definitely say that you do not want to run the unstable channel nor using flakes. Just stick with stable and if you must; add very limited unstable packages via flake configuration. Keep 99.99% on stable and do not use the latest Linux kernel either. Using unstable will result in breaking changes giving you a headache. Trying to run a bleeding edge moder", "context": "years of deep diving Nix/NixOS", "use_case": "servers and dev environments", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS is making me less afraid"}, {"id": 788029952, "item_id": 49251872, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49251872", "by": "unignorant", "date": "2026-08-10", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use a NixOS machine for most of my software work!", "excerpt": "Yes, big fan of Unison (the system I described above follows its model for code hash identity) and I use a NixOS machine for most of my software work!", "context": "software developer", "use_case": "software development OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "Squeak/Smalltalk 6.1 Release Notes"}]}, {"label": "Package availability", "summary": "Compared to Guix, NixOS is seen as having many packages and real adoption.", "quotes": [{"id": 797611408, "item_id": 49850713, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49850713", "by": "Sugimot0", "date": "2026-09-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Now NixOS on the other hand already has an abundance of packages and real adoption.", "excerpt": "I used to wonder this same question and weighed guix and nix quite a bit before moving to the nix camp. Guix on paper really sounds ideal, it feels like a more compelling design, more first principles, it's all scheme, really exciting ideas under the hood. But design intent is not a substitute for the actual user experience. IRL it's too much hassle: weak package coverage, weak ecosystem, a steep learning curve, most", "context": "", "use_case": "declarative system configuration", "switched_from": "", "story": "Dutch governments builds alternative for Microsoft based on NixOS"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "Learning curve", "summary": "The Nix language is hard to learn at first, and the documentation is criticized.", "quotes": [{"id": 779924688, "item_id": 48745293, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48745293", "by": "sunaurus", "date": "2026-07-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Switched to NixOS a few years ago, and I can't overstate the amount of peace it has brought to my life.", "excerpt": "I've been maintaining homelab servers for two decades, used all kinds of IaC approaches etc. Switched to NixOS a few years ago, and I can't overstate the amount of peace it has brought to my life. It just takes so much stress away, compared to everything else I've used before. My only criticism is that the Nix language is not super ergonomic or easy to learn. But with LLMs nowadays, even that is barely ever a problem", "context": "maintained homelab servers for two decades", "use_case": "homelab servers", "switched_from": "", "story": "I Don't Maintain My Homelab"}, {"id": 777536832, "item_id": 48596052, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48596052", "by": "lobofta", "date": "2026-06-19", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Try NixOs.", "excerpt": "Try NixOs. Somewhat of a steep learning curve, but once you're over the hump setting up a machine is about half an hour of work and most of that is just waiting for stuff to download. Set up a new machine the other day and it immediately became my daily driver as everything works nearly exactly as on my other machines.", "context": "", "use_case": "reproducible machine setup", "switched_from": "", "story": "Setting Up a New Windows Laptop in 2026"}, {"id": 800691665, "item_id": 50043229, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50043229", "by": "hamburglar", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it\u2019s gone so well that I now use the same nix config to manage three different machines", "excerpt": "I used nix years ago on a Mac just as a sort of alternative to what I\u2019d otherwise use homebrew for and I really liked it, so I decided a few times that i would try nixos for my laptop. Each time I was stopped by the awful documentation and the weird \u201cflakes are experimental but kinda required\u201d state of the project and I gave up. This year I decided to give it another try and set it up on an ancient laptop using Claud", "context": "", "use_case": "laptop OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "Nix wrote half of my debugger"}]}, {"label": "Package lag", "summary": "Nixpkgs merges and package updates lag behind upstream releases.", "quotes": [{"id": 802670800, "item_id": 50166925, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50166925", "by": "tosser811", "date": "2026-10-20", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I won't be migrating back. Everything is much tighter and saner.", "excerpt": "I used Arch for about a decade before trying out NixOS unstable channel. I won't be migrating back. Everything is much tighter and saner. Only complaint that I'd have is that the pull request merges and package builds lag behind a bit, but I've grown used to that. It's up-to-date enough.", "context": "used Arch for about a decade", "use_case": "daily OS", "switched_from": "Arch Linux", "story": "NixOS is making me less afraid"}, {"id": 779538384, "item_id": 48721149, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48721149", "by": "chem83", "date": "2026-06-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "NixOS has been my daily driver since 2022/2023 and I have greatly improved the management of my 2 computers and few VMs since.", "excerpt": "NixOS has been my daily driver since 2022/2023 and I have greatly improved the management of my 2 computers and few VMs since. Because of LLMs, I now understand the language much better, but even if I didn't want to write Nix directly, describing the config to AI usually produces good results. The two main sticking points IMO are still: - Development environments are still a pain. devenv.sh is great for web and backe", "context": "manages 2 computers and a few VMs", "use_case": "daily driver OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS 26.05 Released"}]}, {"label": "Unstable channel", "summary": "Experienced users advise staying on stable because unstable brings breaking changes.", "quotes": [{"id": 802692000, "item_id": 50168250, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50168250", "by": "Nerdrotic", "date": "2026-10-20", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Where NixOS really shines is in solving software development problems.", "excerpt": "I've spent the last few years deep diving Nix / NixOS and I can definitely say that you do not want to run the unstable channel nor using flakes. Just stick with stable and if you must; add very limited unstable packages via flake configuration. Keep 99.99% on stable and do not use the latest Linux kernel either. Using unstable will result in breaking changes giving you a headache. Trying to run a bleeding edge moder", "context": "years of deep diving Nix/NixOS", "use_case": "servers and dev environments", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS is making me less afraid"}, {"id": 798325504, "item_id": 49895344, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49895344", "by": "erikw", "date": "2026-09-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've never had a failed rollback since using NixOS as my primary OS since around 2016", "excerpt": "I think it depends on what they want it for. I can imagine NixOS being perfect for user workstations for example, as an alternative to Windows workstations managed with Active Directory. I imagine you have a lot more experience than I do packaging for NixOS and other distros given your product, but in the few cases that I've needed to run a binary, I just wrap it with a flake and it's done. I also stay on NixOS stabl", "context": "desktop user since 2016", "use_case": "desktop OS and workstations", "switched_from": "", "story": "US sanctions force The Netherlands off Microsoft and toward alternative NixOS"}]}, {"label": "Dev environments", "summary": "Complex development environments, such as mobile or embedded, are still painful to set up.", "quotes": [{"id": 779538384, "item_id": 48721149, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48721149", "by": "chem83", "date": "2026-06-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "NixOS has been my daily driver since 2022/2023 and I have greatly improved the management of my 2 computers and few VMs since.", "excerpt": "NixOS has been my daily driver since 2022/2023 and I have greatly improved the management of my 2 computers and few VMs since. Because of LLMs, I now understand the language much better, but even if I didn't want to write Nix directly, describing the config to AI usually produces good results. The two main sticking points IMO are still: - Development environments are still a pain. devenv.sh is great for web and backe", "context": "manages 2 computers and a few VMs", "use_case": "daily driver OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS 26.05 Released"}]}, {"label": "Embedded devices", "summary": "One user says it is not yet perfect for embedded devices.", "quotes": [{"id": 786383938, "item_id": 49148996, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49148996", "by": "dhon_", "date": "2026-08-02", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "NixOS isn't perfect for embedded devices yet but works well for cases like this in my experience.", "excerpt": "You can also push deployments to remote systems which is great for servers and headless devices like raspberry pis. I use colmena and deploy-rs on different projects because they have some nice features but you can also do it with bare nix. I have a repo for kiosk appliances that can build an SD card image for a specific device in a fleet (so no on device configuration is required) but it can also push out updates or", "context": "", "use_case": "kiosk appliance fleet images", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: NixOS-DGX-Spark \u2013 Nix and NixOS on the DGX Spark"}]}, {"label": "Skeptics", "summary": "Some commenters call it hype and prefer tools like Ansible or Debian with Docker.", "quotes": [{"id": 778905554, "item_id": 48681597, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48681597", "by": "h4kunamata", "date": "2026-06-25", "stance": "warn", "quote": "NixOS is hype, like everything being moved to Rust and failing miserably.", "excerpt": ">By moving to NixOS, my entire infrastructure is defined in text files. This means my AI agents can read, understand, and even safely modify my infrastructure You lost me there!! Firstly, NixOS is hype, like everything being moved to Rust and failing miserably. Secondly, \"AI ... can .... safely modify my infrastructure\", OP is either being a troll or haven't seem how the whole IT world is upside down because of those", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Migrating from Proxmox to NixOS and Incus"}, {"id": 803206289, "item_id": 50200393, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50200393", "by": "ossusermivami", "date": "2026-10-22", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I used to run freshrss on nixos and moved to hosted debian with docker-compose", "excerpt": "I used to run freshrss on nixos and moved to hosted debian with docker-compose and neveer had a breakage either while using docker compose. says a lot about freshrss not about because running on nixos is being more \"stable\"", "context": "", "use_case": "hosting FreshRSS", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS is making me less afraid"}]}], "who": [{"by": "bigyabai", "context": "hobby game developer", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50267244", "date": "2026-10-27"}, {"by": "Nerdrotic", "context": "years of deep diving Nix/NixOS", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50168250", "date": "2026-10-20"}, {"by": "tosser811", "context": "used Arch for about a decade", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50166925", "date": "2026-10-20"}, {"by": "attilaolah", "context": "self-hosts on many small nodes", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50115461", "date": "2026-10-16"}, {"by": "bengalister", "context": "homelab self-hoster, works with Kubernetes", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50114968", "date": "2026-10-16"}, {"by": "traverseda", "context": "NixOS user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50071303", "date": "2026-10-13"}, {"by": "chickensong", "context": "Nix daily driver for years, Linux user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50040421", "date": "2026-10-11"}, {"by": "flkiwi", "context": "uses ThinkPad and M2 MacBook Pro", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49959349", "date": "2026-10-05"}, {"by": "lobofta", "context": "NixOS user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49943572", "date": "2026-10-03"}, {"by": "erikw", "context": "desktop user since 2016", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49895344", "date": "2026-09-29"}, {"by": "muvlon", "context": "works at a German company", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49894476", "date": "2026-09-29"}, {"by": "basnijholt", "context": "homelab enthusiast", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49881988", "date": "2026-09-28"}], "tags": ["for homelabs", "for servers", "for managing multiple machines", "for developers", "for device fleets"], "use_cases": ["daily os", "daily driver os", "laptop os", "desktop os", "declarative system configuration", "operating system"], "compared": [{"slug": "arch-linux", "name": "Arch Linux", "co": 8, "switched_from": 4, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "debian", "name": "Debian", "co": 9, "switched_from": 2, "switched_to": 1}, {"slug": "ubuntu", "name": "Ubuntu", "co": 8, "switched_from": 2, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "nix", "name": "Nix", "co": 10, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "gentoo", "name": "Gentoo", "co": 5, "switched_from": 2, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "kubernetes", "name": "Kubernetes", "co": 4, "switched_from": 1, "switched_to": 1}, {"slug": "home-manager", "name": "Home Manager", "co": 7, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "gnu-guix", "name": "GNU Guix", "co": 7, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48718753", "title": "NixOS 26.05 Released", "mentions": 10}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47479751", "title": "Why I love NixOS", "mentions": 8}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50165484", "title": "NixOS is making me less afraid", "mentions": 6}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49841563", "title": "Dutch governments builds alternative for Microsoft based on NixOS", "mentions": 5}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49217993", "title": "The Nixpkgs core team has disbanded", "mentions": 5}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47339204", "title": "I stopped using NixOS and went back to Arch Linux", "mentions": 4}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {"neutral": 3, "compare": 2, "recommend": 1}, "2025-12": {"neutral": 1, "recommend": 3}, "2026-01": {"recommend": 8, "neutral": 1, "warn": 1}, "2026-02": {"neutral": 1, "recommend": 1}, "2026-03": {"recommend": 12, "warn": 1}, "2026-04": {"neutral": 3, "recommend": 1}, "2026-05": {"neutral": 1, "recommend": 1}, "2026-06": {"recommend": 17, "warn": 1, "neutral": 1}, "2026-07": {"recommend": 9, "neutral": 3, "compare": 1}, "2026-08": {"recommend": 9, "neutral": 3}, "2026-09": {"recommend": 11, "neutral": 2}, "2026-10": {"neutral": 9, "recommend": 9, "warn": 1}}, "quotes": [{"id": 804275905, "item_id": 50267244, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50267244", "by": "bigyabai", "date": "2026-10-27", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I personally love development on Linux, and I'm making a few hobby games on NixOS right now.", "excerpt": "I agree with everything here. Apple has a perverse incentive to create support churn for games and blame developers, but overall the strategy doesn't work on Mac. It only really panned out on mobile, where gambling apps and gacha games take up Apple's mantle in exchange for access to a larger audience. Which is a rich parallel to Apple's story about the App Store \"protecting consumers\" and the other knee-jerk DSA/DMA", "context": "hobby game developer", "use_case": "game development", "switched_from": "", "story": "New 14\u2011inch MacBook Pro with M6"}, {"id": 803206289, "item_id": 50200393, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50200393", "by": "ossusermivami", "date": "2026-10-22", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I used to run freshrss on nixos and moved to hosted debian with docker-compose", "excerpt": "I used to run freshrss on nixos and moved to hosted debian with docker-compose and neveer had a breakage either while using docker compose. says a lot about freshrss not about because running on nixos is being more \"stable\"", "context": "", "use_case": "hosting FreshRSS", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS is making me less afraid"}, {"id": 802990323, "item_id": 50186895, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50186895", "by": "routelastresort", "date": "2026-10-21", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "including a little NixOS for fun", "excerpt": "I use nix-darwin and nix on CachyOS (and pretty much everything else, including a little NixOS for fun), daily. I can confirm all of your comments, and someone will come up with something similar that's easier on the eyes.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS is making me less afraid"}, {"id": 802821105, "item_id": 50176319, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50176319", "by": "chuckadams", "date": "2026-10-21", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "My NixOS box is there to run Steam", "excerpt": "Guix being ideologically opposed to supporting macOS is what keeps me using Nix on my daily driver box. My NixOS box is there to run Steam, which I suspect is something Guix would also regard as anathema.", "context": "", "use_case": "running Steam", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS is making me less afraid"}, {"id": 802818834, "item_id": 50176177, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50176177", "by": "dlivingston", "date": "2026-10-21", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "you could customize it to look like any distro or even something totally new", "excerpt": "The default is a bare-bones GNOME desktop manger (think Ubuntu if you're not familiar). But of course you could customize it to look like any distro or even something totally new; I use hyprland with a pretty unique setup.", "context": "", "use_case": "desktop OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS is making me less afraid"}, {"id": 802692000, "item_id": 50168250, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50168250", "by": "Nerdrotic", "date": "2026-10-20", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Where NixOS really shines is in solving software development problems.", "excerpt": "I've spent the last few years deep diving Nix / NixOS and I can definitely say that you do not want to run the unstable channel nor using flakes. Just stick with stable and if you must; add very limited unstable packages via flake configuration. Keep 99.99% on stable and do not use the latest Linux kernel either. Using unstable will result in breaking changes giving you a headache. Trying to run a bleeding edge moder", "context": "years of deep diving Nix/NixOS", "use_case": "servers and dev environments", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS is making me less afraid"}, {"id": 802670800, "item_id": 50166925, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50166925", "by": "tosser811", "date": "2026-10-20", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I won't be migrating back. Everything is much tighter and saner.", "excerpt": "I used Arch for about a decade before trying out NixOS unstable channel. I won't be migrating back. Everything is much tighter and saner. Only complaint that I'd have is that the pull request merges and package builds lag behind a bit, but I've grown used to that. It's up-to-date enough.", "context": "used Arch for about a decade", "use_case": "daily OS", "switched_from": "Arch Linux", "story": "NixOS is making me less afraid"}, {"id": 802576115, "item_id": 50161007, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50161007", "by": "clundin22", "date": "2026-10-20", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I manage the raspberry pi with NixOS which makes the setup easy and deployable", "excerpt": "I use a raspberry pi and nginx to forward my jellyfin over Tailscale. This works really well, Tailscale is low touch and nginx is battletested. Jellyfin appears as a local service to other devices and I manage the raspberry pi with NixOS which makes the setup easy and deployable. Just plug in the pre imaged raspberry pi.", "context": "", "use_case": "managing a Raspberry Pi", "switched_from": "", "story": "Plex vulnerabilities being exploited in the wild to drop a cryptominer"}, {"id": 801864115, "item_id": 50116507, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50116507", "by": "bengalister", "date": "2026-10-16", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I had to use an avahi relay on the NixOS host", "excerpt": "So far it is ok. I even have a usb zigbee dongle receiver in usb passthrough and the container in privileged mode. I am moving to the Apple ecosystem and I managed to have homekit bridge connected to Apple home. I had to use an avahi relay on the NixOS host for the discovery protocol to work. The home assistant is not the same network as my devices. The homekit bridge allows to configure the advertised IP. I use tail", "context": "", "use_case": "host OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "What I self-host"}, {"id": 801847376, "item_id": 50115461, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50115461", "by": "attilaolah", "date": "2026-10-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Eventually I switched to Systemd only, Clan-managed NixOS instances on bare metal.", "excerpt": "I also used to run everything on K8s (hybrid Talos / Alpine+k0s on nodes too small for Talos). It is a fun exercise, but with many small nodes eventually I realised I was burning a quarter of my fleet's CPU on just monitoring and routing services. Eventually I switched to Systemd only, Clan-managed NixOS instances on bare metal. The killer feature for me is socket activation. It even works with Jellyfin, wrapped in s", "context": "self-hosts on many small nodes", "use_case": "homelab server OS", "switched_from": "Kubernetes", "story": "What I self-host"}, {"id": 801839488, "item_id": 50114968, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50114968", "by": "bengalister", "date": "2026-10-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I am very happy with NixOS.", "excerpt": "I also self host some services: keycloak, forgejo, home assistant, immich, grafana/prometheus, jellyfin, pureftp (to store my surveillance cameras videos), and a vibecoded financial app, and soon hermes agent on a 2023 laptop. I chose to run most of them on Kubernetes since I am used to work with it. I use: - ha-proxy running on the host and istio running inside the cluster for the sni based ingress routing - cert-ma", "context": "homelab self-hoster, works with Kubernetes", "use_case": "declarative host and VM management", "switched_from": "", "story": "What I self-host"}, {"id": 801666209, "item_id": 50104138, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50104138", "by": "c7b", "date": "2026-10-15", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "The new \"I use x, btw\" would be nixOS.", "excerpt": "CachyOS is probably the new hip one (Arch-based). The new \"I use x, btw\" would be nixOS. Arguably, the distro matters a lot less if you use containers or flatpaks for most things (which I'd recommend). So there's nothing standing against using just boring Debian stable these days, or Fedora if you want to be more up to date. If you like fancy UI, check out the COSMIC desktop environment, should work on all mentioned.", "context": "", "use_case": "Linux distro", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ubuntu 26.10 (Stonking Stingray) released"}, {"id": 801302736, "item_id": 50081421, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50081421", "by": "bigyabai", "date": "2026-10-14", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I've got a Termux with NixOS installed on my Android handset.", "excerpt": "> I wish I could use Arch on mobile. You totally can. I've got a Termux with NixOS installed on my Android handset. There's also Phosh if you want a fully Arch-native install on your phone. Wouldn't be my choice for a mobile OS, but I don't see any roadblocks to using it.", "context": "", "use_case": "OS on Android phone", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Where has creativity in software gone?"}, {"id": 801140849, "item_id": 50071303, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50071303", "by": "traverseda", "date": "2026-10-13", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use the policy engine on nixos", "excerpt": "Firefox already had a very mature policy management engine, it just didn't have a nice gui and would require like ansible or something to use. It allows forcing specific extensions on, and allowing user installs is a flag. I use the policy engine on nixos to install some plugins and disable some of firefox's dumber features.", "context": "NixOS user", "use_case": "configuring Firefox", "switched_from": "", "story": "Firefox Enterprise"}, {"id": 800691665, "item_id": 50043229, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50043229", "by": "hamburglar", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it\u2019s gone so well that I now use the same nix config to manage three different machines", "excerpt": "I used nix years ago on a Mac just as a sort of alternative to what I\u2019d otherwise use homebrew for and I really liked it, so I decided a few times that i would try nixos for my laptop. Each time I was stopped by the awful documentation and the weird \u201cflakes are experimental but kinda required\u201d state of the project and I gave up. This year I decided to give it another try and set it up on an ancient laptop using Claud", "context": "", "use_case": "laptop OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "Nix wrote half of my debugger"}, {"id": 800646736, "item_id": 50040421, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50040421", "by": "chickensong", "date": "2026-10-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "NixOS is a breath of fresh air and has reinvigorated my love of Linux.", "excerpt": "Nix daily driver for years here. I don't know what they did to screw up their system like that, but it's unusual IME. Normally you can just reboot and load the previous profile. Even in the absolute worst case, as long as you have your config, you could boot the installer and then load your config and your system comes back exactly as it was. It's definitely not beta software. FWIW, I used Debian more than anything o", "context": "Nix daily driver for years, Linux user", "use_case": "daily driver OS", "switched_from": "Debian", "story": "Nix wrote half of my debugger"}, {"id": 800282682, "item_id": 50017667, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50017667", "by": "wraptile", "date": "2026-10-09", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Everything on nixos with config repo that configs all of my machines with claude code.", "excerpt": "These VPS no longer make much sense for self-hosting imo. I have two refurbished 32gb ram Lenovo k14 laptops (250$ each) that I use for self-hosting over tailscale and cloudflare tunnels. This is a lot of compute and very little power use. One for personal self-hosted projects: languagetool, nextcloud, hister, syncthing, restic backups, vaultwarden, windmill. Another for public facing web apps I host through cloudfla", "context": "", "use_case": "declarative machine config", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What do you run on a $5 VPS that's worth keeping online 24/7?"}, {"id": 799349840, "item_id": 49959365, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49959365", "by": "isityettime", "date": "2026-10-05", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "30-40 GB is how much space I use on it for the OS and all applications", "excerpt": "5% is huge. And the way app bundles work on macOS, tons and tons of disk space gets burned up for each application relative to on an OS like Linux distros, so each GB doesn't go as far in the first place. It's also not the full extent of disk usage by built-in apps which aren't removable by normal means on macOS. An empty macOS installation is like 35 GB. NixOS is not known for being particularly space efficient, but", "context": "", "use_case": "graphical systems with dev tools", "switched_from": "", "story": "Turn off Apple Intelligence on macOS 27 and get its disk space back"}, {"id": 799349584, "item_id": 49959349, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49959349", "by": "flkiwi", "date": "2026-10-05", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use both macOS and Linux (NixOS + gnome/niri) regularly.", "excerpt": "I use both macOS and Linux (NixOS + gnome/niri) regularly. When everything is working properly--and, to be clear, I'm talking about the macOS side--I see almost no difference between the two operating systems. I'm on a ThinkPad on one side and an M2 Macbook Pro on the other. The only meaningful difference not attributable to something like different screen size is that Apple displays are damn good, and their speakers", "context": "uses ThinkPad and M2 MacBook Pro", "use_case": "daily OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "Turn off Apple Intelligence on macOS 27 and get its disk space back"}, {"id": 799097154, "item_id": 49943572, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49943572", "by": "lobofta", "date": "2026-10-03", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Were I not a NixOs nerd", "excerpt": "Desktop shells may be the answer. I use Noctalia with Niri and it's a smooth ride. Were I not a NixOs nerd I'd recommend this setup to any noob.", "context": "NixOS user", "use_case": "daily OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "Make Tmux the OS"}, {"id": 798782000, "item_id": 49923875, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49923875", "by": "ddellacosta", "date": "2026-10-01", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I love NixOS and use it on my work and home machines, but I balk at seriously suggesting anyone pick that as their first choice", "excerpt": "I love NixOS and use it on my work and home machines, but I balk at seriously suggesting anyone pick that as their first choice for a stable Linux distro to move to. It's filled with sharp edges, and more to the point, the project leadership and governance seems mired in drama constantly. Not a system I would feel comfortable suggesting any org should adopt without a lot of consideration, especially if stability and ", "context": "", "use_case": "work and home machines", "switched_from": "", "story": "Red Hat being phased out of existence?"}, {"id": 798565776, "item_id": 49910361, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49910361", "by": "silverbluep", "date": "2026-09-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I'm full on nixos and home manager so I'm going plasma manager route.", "excerpt": "I don't have solutions for you; i want to also keep my KDE settings saved. But I'm full on nixos and home manager so I'm going plasma manager route. Technically you could use plasma-manager on any distro; you install nix, and use home-manager standalone. I think with KDE; you would want to skip package management, but doable; I used to do with arch. I guess depends on what you already use for configuration management", "context": "", "use_case": "system configuration management", "switched_from": "Arch Linux", "story": "Ask HN: How do you sync or migrate KDE settings?"}, {"id": 798325504, "item_id": 49895344, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49895344", "by": "erikw", "date": "2026-09-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've never had a failed rollback since using NixOS as my primary OS since around 2016", "excerpt": "I think it depends on what they want it for. I can imagine NixOS being perfect for user workstations for example, as an alternative to Windows workstations managed with Active Directory. I imagine you have a lot more experience than I do packaging for NixOS and other distros given your product, but in the few cases that I've needed to run a binary, I just wrap it with a flake and it's done. I also stay on NixOS stabl", "context": "desktop user since 2016", "use_case": "desktop OS and workstations", "switched_from": "", "story": "US sanctions force The Netherlands off Microsoft and toward alternative NixOS"}, {"id": 798311616, "item_id": 49894476, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49894476", "by": "muvlon", "date": "2026-09-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "We use NixOS for everybody at work even though we're a German company.", "excerpt": "I think NixOS is also just much better suited for this particular job than SUSE. We use NixOS for everybody at work even though we're a German company.", "context": "works at a German company", "use_case": "work operating system", "switched_from": "", "story": "US sanctions force The Netherlands off Microsoft and toward alternative NixOS"}, {"id": 798111808, "item_id": 49881988, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49881988", "by": "basnijholt", "date": "2026-09-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "while I absolutely love NixOS", "excerpt": "Hi all, after being fully Nix pilled for the last two years, and being a massive homelab enthusiast for many more years, I finally wrote down exactly how my homelab works. NixOS carries almost all of it. And while I absolutely love NixOS, it doesn't solve all my problems. So, for some of the bits, I rely on my own tools with the NixOS (declarative everything) philosophy. Hope it might be interesting to some :)", "context": "homelab enthusiast", "use_case": "declarative homelab", "switched_from": "", "story": "My declarative multi-machine homelab"}, {"id": 797611408, "item_id": 49850713, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49850713", "by": "Sugimot0", "date": "2026-09-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Now NixOS on the other hand already has an abundance of packages and real adoption.", "excerpt": "I used to wonder this same question and weighed guix and nix quite a bit before moving to the nix camp. Guix on paper really sounds ideal, it feels like a more compelling design, more first principles, it's all scheme, really exciting ideas under the hood. But design intent is not a substitute for the actual user experience. IRL it's too much hassle: weak package coverage, weak ecosystem, a steep learning curve, most", "context": "", "use_case": "declarative system configuration", "switched_from": "", "story": "Dutch governments builds alternative for Microsoft based on NixOS"}, {"id": 797611328, "item_id": 49850708, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49850708", "by": "Sugimot0", "date": "2026-09-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Now NixOS on the other hand already has an abundance of packages and real adoption.", "excerpt": "I used to wonder this same question and weighed guix and nix quite a bit before moving to the nix camp. Guix on paper really sounds ideal, it feels like a more compelling design, more first principles, it's all scheme, really exciting ideas under the hood. But design intent is not a substitute for the actual user experience. IRL it's too much hassle: weak package coverage, weak ecosystem, a steep learning curve, most", "context": "", "use_case": "declarative system configuration", "switched_from": "", "story": "Dutch governments builds alternative for Microsoft based on NixOS"}, {"id": 797482864, "item_id": 49842679, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49842679", "by": "tcfhgj", "date": "2026-09-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "So far I have broken every Linux distro I used except NixOS.", "excerpt": "So far I have broken every Linux distro I used except NixOS. And if I were to break it, i could just reboot into the previous system snapshot. And I haven't read 1000 pages of docs - from my experience id doubt it even has that many docs.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Dutch governments builds alternative for Microsoft based on NixOS"}, {"id": 797476720, "item_id": 49842295, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49842295", "by": "dminik", "date": "2026-09-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've yet to get a system that was as stable as it.", "excerpt": "Each nixos rebuild creates a snapshot. While I also eventually moved off of nixos, I've yet to get a system that was as stable as it.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Dutch governments builds alternative for Microsoft based on NixOS"}, {"id": 797472288, "item_id": 49842018, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49842018", "by": "solarkraft", "date": "2026-09-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I believe NixOS is perfect for systems you just want to work and track reproducibly", "excerpt": "Awesome! I believe NixOS is perfect for systems you just want to work and track reproducibly, like appliances (which a lot of server software is supposed to be). I\u2019m glad people smarter than me are actually able to realize its advantages =) In the same space, also check out openDesk initiated by the German Government (https://www.opendesk.eu/en) and La Suite by the French one (https://lasuite.numerique.gouv.fr/). AFA", "context": "", "use_case": "appliance-like servers", "switched_from": "", "story": "Dutch governments builds alternative for Microsoft based on NixOS"}, {"id": 796616657, "item_id": 49788541, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49788541", "by": "pixeljam", "date": "2026-09-21", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "add it to my NixOS config", "excerpt": "Does this I can finally add it to my NixOS config without having to use `permittedInsecurePackages`? https://github.com/sublimehq/sublime_text/issues/5984 :)", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Sublime Text Build 4213"}, {"id": 795464336, "item_id": 49716521, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49716521", "by": "tombert", "date": "2026-09-15", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I'm fairly happy with my obscenely over-customized NixOS Sway desktop", "excerpt": "I am a pretty die-hard NixOS cultist, but I will admit that I actually like macOS. I used macOS almost exclusively from 2020-2024, until I bought my Thinkpad that I have now, and I never really disliked the operating system (though I did have issues with that particular laptop because of the i9 CPU's propensity to thermal-throttle). Despite me preferring it, it is hard for me to say that desktop Linux is \"better\" in ", "context": "Linux/NixOS user", "use_case": "daily desktop", "switched_from": "macOS", "story": "Leaving Linux"}, {"id": 794387184, "item_id": 49649199, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49649199", "by": "craftkiller", "date": "2026-09-10", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I build it all via NixOS and I use Impermanence to manage the bind mounts to the persist drive", "excerpt": "The iso itself is read-only. When I need to update software I build a whole new iso and replace the existing one. For any folders/files that need persistence across reboots, I store that data separately from the iso, either in a virtual nvme drive or a mounted 9pfs folder from the host. The iso mounts the persistence drive/9pfs via /etc/fstab. So in the end, the software and config files are read-only (until I replac", "context": "", "use_case": "building read-only VM ISOs", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Syq \u2013 copy files between machines fast (better than rsync)"}, {"id": 792869233, "item_id": 49554327, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49554327", "by": "tombert", "date": "2026-09-03", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "My main \"game console\" is a NixOS box running Jovian", "excerpt": "Valve is also pretty amenable to adding third-party games to the box as well. It's trivial to add games from GOG using Heroic and play them alongside regular Steam games. My main \"game console\" is a NixOS box running Jovian, and I have made oodles of Flakes that I use to make custom non-Steam games that launch deterministically, and as far as I'm aware, Valve is perfectly fine with this (not that I particularly care ", "context": "", "use_case": "main game console", "switched_from": "", "story": "Sony makes bold claim about game ownership"}, {"id": 792742867, "item_id": 49546429, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49546429", "by": "gotlou", "date": "2026-09-03", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I've been constantly updating and experimenting with my NixOS config", "excerpt": "Location: New Delhi, India Remote: Yes Willing to relocate: within India Technologies: Rust, C++, C, Python, Go, Postgres, MySQL, SQL, Linux, Nix, Java, C# R\u00e9sum\u00e9/CV: https://gotlou.com/resume.pdf Email: hi@gotlou.com Blog: https://gotlou.com LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/saksham--mittal I'm a 2025 grad, and am looking for a good full time software engineering role. I've worked at Morgan Stanley as a fullstac", "context": "2025 grad seeking software engineering role", "use_case": "personal OS configuration", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (September 2026)"}, {"id": 792327072, "item_id": 49520442, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49520442", "by": "haskman", "date": "2026-09-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use a DGX Spark with NixOS on it as my daily driver and it's fantastic.", "excerpt": "A Mac Mini with M5 Pro, half the memory of a DGX Spark, half the disk of DGX Spark, and no CUDA, is already more expensive than a spark. The Spark runs Linux natively, has a tiny form factor, and is usable as a general purpose computer. I use a DGX Spark with NixOS on it as my daily driver and it's fantastic.", "context": "", "use_case": "daily driver OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple caught off guard by AI demand for Mac Mini and Mac Studio"}, {"id": 792046544, "item_id": 49502909, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49502909", "by": "toshinoriyagi", "date": "2026-08-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've been using NixOS for years and it's awesome. Total game changer for managing my PC and development environments.", "excerpt": "I don't think this is true. I've been using NixOS for years and it's awesome. Total game changer for managing my PC and development environments. More adoption will help of course, but I certainly haven't needed it to get tons of value from Nix.", "context": "", "use_case": "managing PC and dev environments", "switched_from": "", "story": "One Nix flake to rule them all"}, {"id": 791664976, "item_id": 49479061, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49479061", "by": "anon291", "date": "2026-08-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Nixos has kept my laptop running for almost a decade at this point with no performance degradation.", "excerpt": "It shouldn't be offensive. The assessment is accurate. I used to think computers 'degraded' and got slower and worse over time. It always seemed weird to me since logically, the silicon is there. However, when you run a proper operating system, there's no degradation. It's a software problem in its entirety. Nixos has kept my laptop running for almost a decade at this point with no performance degradation. I am only ", "context": "", "use_case": "laptop OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "Get your Windows license refund"}, {"id": 790268800, "item_id": 49391800, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49391800", "by": "yipinwong", "date": "2026-08-21", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "NixOS is immutable, thus creates separate sandboxes (building/taking down) per agent", "excerpt": "Check out some NIXOS communities. People they are doing fun crazy stuff, as NixOS is immutable, thus creates separate sandboxes (building/taking down) per agent, etc. I don't know most of the stuff there, but at least you can dive there.", "context": "", "use_case": "sandboxing AI agents", "switched_from": "", "story": "A self hosted AI software factory"}, {"id": 789846513, "item_id": 49365407, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49365407", "by": "Eueudhsbsj32", "date": "2026-08-19", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Very easy and secure with NixOS", "excerpt": "On my Linux laptop, I use bubblewrap sandboxes with their own encrypted filesystems and granular permissions for each of my projects. Very easy and secure with NixOS, surely better than what I could do with an Android device.", "context": "Linux laptop user", "use_case": "laptop OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "GrapheneOS in 2027 available on high-end Motorola phones"}, {"id": 785005936, "item_id": 49062871, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49062871", "by": "CatDadCode", "date": "2026-07-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "NixOS is definitely my preferred place to be now because the AI can maintain the declaration tree", "excerpt": "I've been driving NixOS with Codex and it's simply amazing. I used to regard Nix as a hobbyist thing that I couldn't bother with because it's tedious and complex even though the declarative nature of it is so cool. Now the tedious and complex parts are gone, leaving only the benefits. NixOS is definitely my preferred place to be now because the AI can maintain the declaration tree while me a monkey just say \"me want ", "context": "", "use_case": "declarative OS configuration with AI", "switched_from": "", "story": "Moonshine: Lets you stream games from your PC to any device running Moonlight"}, {"id": 779924688, "item_id": 48745293, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48745293", "by": "sunaurus", "date": "2026-07-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Switched to NixOS a few years ago, and I can't overstate the amount of peace it has brought to my life.", "excerpt": "I've been maintaining homelab servers for two decades, used all kinds of IaC approaches etc. Switched to NixOS a few years ago, and I can't overstate the amount of peace it has brought to my life. It just takes so much stress away, compared to everything else I've used before. My only criticism is that the Nix language is not super ergonomic or easy to learn. But with LLMs nowadays, even that is barely ever a problem", "context": "maintained homelab servers for two decades", "use_case": "homelab servers", "switched_from": "", "story": "I Don't Maintain My Homelab"}, {"id": 779915904, "item_id": 48744744, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48744744", "by": "kamov", "date": "2026-07-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "It's been normal for me for the past 3 years thanks to using NixOS for all server infrastructure.", "excerpt": "> I've approximated it somewhere around 15 minutes of maintenance per month, barring an emergency. If that's normal to you, congrats - you've peaked in life. However, that's absolutely absurd to me. I used to spend days on end building, maintaining, and debugging various aspects of my servers, databases, apps, etc. It's been normal for me for the past 3 years thanks to using NixOS for all server infrastructure.", "context": "", "use_case": "server infrastructure", "switched_from": "", "story": "I Don't Maintain My Homelab"}, {"id": 779874560, "item_id": 48742160, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48742160", "by": "pmarreck", "date": "2026-06-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Once you grok this, doing it any other way will seem insane.", "excerpt": "The entire system configuration is one file or a small set of files. If you copy it to a different machine, you can \"run\" it and get pretty much the same machine. If you screw up the config, the system tells you before it even tries to apply it. If something breaks while applying it (which is rare), NOTHING is broken because the entire system still points at the old instance, since cutover is atomic. This is already ", "context": "has bricked other Linux distros", "use_case": "reproducible daily-driver system", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS 26.05 Released"}, {"id": 779674272, "item_id": 48729642, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48729642", "by": "QuiCasseRien", "date": "2026-06-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I really use the power of nix/nixos since Codex is doing good code with it.", "excerpt": "> It seems anecdotally like LLMs have really given it a boost recently I have been using Nixos for the past 5 years. And I really use the power of nix/nixos since Codex is doing good code with it. Setup easily systemd-user unit with podman rootless, backup, writing script during build...", "context": "NixOS user for 5 years", "use_case": "system configuration", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS 26.05 Released"}, {"id": 779578865, "item_id": 48723679, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48723679", "by": "rhco", "date": "2026-06-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "NixOS makes sure the system itself is identical", "excerpt": "You could take this one step further using Syncthing to sync important data between the workstation and laptop. That's how my devices are configured, and it's amazing - if I need to travel for work, I just pick up my laptop and go. NixOS makes sure the system itself is identical (apps, most of the code configs, etc), then any app-spcific config is handled by Syncthing. It was really magical the first few times I used", "context": "", "use_case": "reproducible workstation and laptop", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS 26.05 Released"}, {"id": 779543968, "item_id": 48721498, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48721498", "by": "mplanchard", "date": "2026-06-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love seeing all these posts from NixOS newcomers!", "excerpt": "I love seeing all these posts from NixOS newcomers! It seems anecdotally like LLMs have really given it a boost recently, I guess by reducing the intimidation factor of the language and the unfamiliarity? Of all the positive and negative outcomes I have imagined from LLMs, NixOS becoming popular was not one of them, but I'll take it.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS 26.05 Released"}, {"id": 779538496, "item_id": 48721156, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48721156", "by": "jon-wood", "date": "2026-06-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love the slightly weird learning curve on NixOS", "excerpt": "I love the slightly weird learning curve on NixOS where initially it seems incredibly complex writing this weird functional programming language for every change you want to apply to your system, then over time it clicks and you end up in a place where any operating system that doesn't define everything in a weird functional programming language seems incredibly complex. I read blog posts about doing things on other ", "context": "", "use_case": "declarative system configuration", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS 26.05 Released"}, {"id": 779538384, "item_id": 48721149, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48721149", "by": "chem83", "date": "2026-06-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "NixOS has been my daily driver since 2022/2023 and I have greatly improved the management of my 2 computers and few VMs since.", "excerpt": "NixOS has been my daily driver since 2022/2023 and I have greatly improved the management of my 2 computers and few VMs since. Because of LLMs, I now understand the language much better, but even if I didn't want to write Nix directly, describing the config to AI usually produces good results. The two main sticking points IMO are still: - Development environments are still a pain. devenv.sh is great for web and backe", "context": "manages 2 computers and a few VMs", "use_case": "daily driver OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "NixOS 26.05 Released"}, {"id": 777536832, "item_id": 48596052, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48596052", "by": "lobofta", "date": "2026-06-19", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Try NixOs.", "excerpt": "Try NixOs. Somewhat of a steep learning curve, but once you're over the hump setting up a machine is about half an hour of work and most of that is just waiting for stuff to download. Set up a new machine the other day and it immediately became my daily driver as everything works nearly exactly as on my other machines.", "context": "", "use_case": "reproducible machine setup", "switched_from": "", "story": "Setting Up a New Windows Laptop in 2026"}]}