Summary
Arch Linux and Fedora are held in high regard in Linux circles.
Both user bases eagerly champion their favored distribution, but which is right for you?
Lets see how they compare.
Dave McKay / How-To Geek
Isnt It All Linux Under the Hood?
And, at the heart of every Linux distribution, thats what youll find.
Its the littleor not so littleextras that each distribution adds that make their distribution different from other operating systems.
The challenge is working out which distributions unique traits make that the distribution for you.
Some distributions, like Arch Linux, are their own thing entirely.
Arch Linux was built from scratch.
Its not a derivative of another distribution.
Other distributions stand on the shoulders of those who came before.
Fedora Linux can trace its family tree back to the original free versions of Red Hat Linux.
Arch provides a pared-back, bare-bones Linux installation.
You then drop in the applications you want.
It doesnt come preloaded with a default set of applications.
Fedora gives you a system you’re free to become immediately productive on.
Arch is backed by an independent community, and Fedora has a communityand a corporationbehind it.
Arch Linux and Fedora Linux are great distributions, with some significant differences.
Unhelpful elitism aside, the answer to the dilemma was research.
You were expected to do a lot of reading before you started.
Even users of other distributions turn to it for detailed coverage of topics.
Because the Arch installer asks a lot of questions, youre going to need a lot of answers.
Its up to you to find those answers in advance.
The Arch Wiki is where youll find them.
The situation has improved with the introduction of a text user interface installer, calledarchinstall.
The archinstall program runs in a terminal window and provides a degree of hand-holding.
It offers sane defaults and performs some system analysis such as identifying the hard drives attached to your machine.
It’s similar enough to the installers of other distributions that it won’t present any problems.
Its used on Red Hat Enterprise Linux too.
Detection of hardware and configuring drivers is done for you by Fedora, seamlessly and painlessly.
Not only that, but Fedora supports more platforms than Arch Linux.
Arch Linux only supportsx86_64.
Neither Arch Linux nor Fedora Linux officially supports 32-bit architectures.
Updates: Arch Favors Speed, Fedora Favors Stability
Arch Linux uses a rolling release model.
Updates, upgrades, and patches are released when theyre available.
The constant trickle of smaller updates replaces the biannual major updates of point release systems like Fedora.
Each new version of Fedora contains all the updates and patches since the last version.
A new release of Fedora Linux is launched about every six months.
The key word there isabout.
Fedora releases will be delayed if required, until bugs are ironed out.
With Fedora, stability is everything.
But with Archs accelerated turnaround, you dont need to wait long for a fix.
Some people struggle with the frequency of updates for Arch Linux, but it isnt a problem.
Its not unusual to get update notifications daily, sometimes more often than that.
But you dont need to apply them then and there.
it’s possible for you to apply them in one hit once a week or so.
Otherwise, do your updates at a time that suits you.
This is supplemented by an enormous, user-driven repository called the Arch User Repository.
This is accessed using an AUR helper program such as Yay.
Youll find all manner of free, open-source, closed-source, and even commercial packages in the AUR.
The Fedora command-line software installation tool is DNF.
Fedora uses the well-knownRPM package format.
This is similar to Archs AUR, but you wont find any closed-source applications in it.
Fedora is more restrictive about what can be stored in their repositories.
I always find Pacman to be noticeably faster than DNF.That might not mean anything to you.
You don’t spend all day every day installing software, after all.
TheArch Linux Wikiremains the gold standard for Linux information in general, and Arch Linux in particular.
Fedora is served by theFedora Documentationsite.
Arch LinuxandFedora Linuxeach have official forums, and youll find plenty of unofficial ones too.
Likewise, there are unofficialFedora LinuxandArch Linuxsubreddits andFedoraandArch LinuxDiscord channels.
Arch Linux or Fedora?
Wear the Shoe That Fits
Arch Linux gives you more control at the cost of extra effort.
