blendOS has gained quite some reputation for its all-in-one feature.
But is it good enough to make you stop distro-hopping?
Whats So Special About blendOS Anyway?
blendOS is animmutable Linux distributionbased onArch Linuxwith a rolling release model.
As of v4 (which I’m covering in this review), blendOS is fully declarative.
In other words, the system.yaml file lets you define your desired state of the system.
Instead, it uses Podman containers to install and run applications.
That’s why you might have multiple Linux distros as containers and gain access to their respective package managers.
The distro also has its own package manager called bpkg.
Lucas Gouveia / How-To Geek | BlendOS
It allows you to use package managers from different containers you set up in the system.
It doesn’t come with blendOS by default and requires installation.
bpkg is also configurable using a YAML file.
You also have out-of-the-box support forFlatpaks, Arch Linux, andAURpackages.
blendOS offers a large pool of desktop environments.
You have GNOME, KDE, MATE, XFCE, Cinnamon, and LXQt.
The default installation comes with GNOME.
The Installation Was Simple
blendOS is based on Arch Linux.
Luckily, many Arch-based distros can beinstalled using a GUI installer.
blendOS uses the Jade GUI installer.
The process was straightforward, like installing otherpopular Linux distros.
You choose a few controls, such as language, region, and disk partitioning.
The installer handles the rest.
before you get going installing blendOS, verify you allocate enough disk space (at least 20GB.)
Otherwise, the installation may fail.
Managing Software and Updates
blendOS uses containerization technology for managing software.
You set up containers for different distributions inside blendOS and then use software from within those containers.
You will find a blendOS tweaks menu from which you’re able to create containers.
You’ll find your containers listed in the same menu.
You may think that to install and update software, you have to open a container for a distro.
However, that’s not necessary.
With a special syntax, you could install and run apps directly from the base blendOS system.
All you have to do is put a period (.)
sign after the package name and then the name of the distro.
Suppose I want to install VLC media player on the Debian container.
Let’s say, you always want to use the GIMP installed in the Ubuntu container.
you might associate GIMP’s package with Ubuntu so that you don’t have to add prefixes.
it’s possible for you to manage associations from the system options.
In my case, to launch GIMP, I only need to rungimpon the command line without any prefixes.
But not everyone likes to remember commands for launching apps.
You don’t have to.
Any app you install on any container will also appear in the apps menu.
it’s possible for you to go to the apps menu and launch the app from the GUI.
There’s also a dedicated GUI software store in blendOS similar to the one you get on Ubuntu.
you’ve got the option to search and install software from there as well.
The software in the store comes from Flathub.
For system updates, blendOS offers a utility tool called “akshara.”
This update also covers any system changes you included in the system.yaml file.
So after updating, you should probably reboot the system.
you could also update individual containers.
For that, open a container and initiate the command to update that distro.
For Debian, you runsudo apt updateand for Fedora, you runsudo dnf updatein the container’s command line.
Android App Support Looks Promising
blendOS allows you to install Android apps directly on the system throughWaydroid.
It lets you install F-Droid and Aurora Store for accessing and installing Android apps.
You’ll first have to initialize Waydroid from the system tweaks.
After the initialization, it’s possible for you to set up the app stores.
you’ve got the option to install and set up Waydroid in other Linux distributions too.
However, blendOS removes the installation hassle and makes it a part of the initial setup.
However, as I’m writing this, the Android experience on blendOS was subpar at best.
The idea is great and needs better implementation.
More on this in a bit.
A Recipe for Disaster?
The very first concern anyone can raise about blendOS is the mixture of different distributions and package managers.
I’ll have to say that blendOS has implemented this pretty well.
I’ve used Debian, Ubuntu, Fedora, and Arch containers, and installed software on them.
I haven’t faced any problems so far.
Associations is a neat feature that enables you to forget which package is from which container.
So no need to worry about that either.
So is blendOS fault-proof?
I faced some challenges when using this distro.
The performance also doesn’t feel on the same level as using applications natively on a distro.
So expect some lags here and there.
To be fair here, blendOS v4 has been released recently.
So you should expect bugs, strange behaviors, and the system breaking more often.
For instance, I faced an infinite loop during the installation process.
Some users reported another problem during installation where the process gets stuck while retrieving packages and keeps repeating.
With small tweaks, you could fix these problems though.
Unlike many other large distributions, you shouldn’t expect a “just works” experience from blendOS.
There were instances where I had to reboot because the screen got stuck forever.
This was more visible when I tried to do multitasking.
The Android support also felt quite buggy.
The initialization was straightforward.
Initializing Waydroid automatically installs some Android utility apps such as a calculator, file manager, calendar, etc.
However, I was unable to open any of them.
I’m not sure whether this was a Waydroid or blendOS problem.
Another issue is when you reboot, you’ll need to install F-Droid and Aurora Store again.
You won’t find them in the applications menu.
The white screen problem isn’t limited to Waydroid.
blendOS Is for You if…
blendOS is still quite new.
The latest version v4 was just released.
As with any distro, it will take some time to reach a more stable and usable condition.
That being said, it’s certainly not a daily driver kind of distro yet.
Firstly, you’ll need good hardware to even run it properly.
blendOS recommends a minimum of 4GB of RAM and 25GB of storage space.
But you’ll have a sluggish experience with that.
Running multiple apps from multiple containers will eat up a good amount of RAM.
Not to mention, the more containers you download, the faster you’ll run out of space.
Secondly, it’s not as polished as other popular distros.
you might do basic tasks without much hassle.
But power users and multitaskers will feel disappointed.
There’s also a learning curve even if you’re an experienced Linux user.
Not all functionalities work all the time and the best form of support is their Discord server.
Other than that, you won’t find much help regarding the distro.
Whether having multiple distros in one is a good idea or not will vary from person to person.
If that’s your thing, go for it.
Another big plus for blendOS is its declarative nature.
It’s not everyone’s cup of tea.
But even putting that aside, there are several areas to improve.
For now, we need more robust Android app support.
The documentation is okay but needs to be more comprehensive.
Support is limited for now, but hopefully, that changes as more people adopt it.
With all that said, I look forward to daily driving blendOS once it becomes more mature.
