Migrating from Windows 11 to Linux: A Practical Guide
So I finally did it. After two years of dual-booting, I made the full switch to Fedora KDE Plasma as my daily driver and I have not looked back. This post covers why I left Windows 11, why I chose Fedora, how I set everything up, and what my experience has been like since.
My machine is nothing special: an 11th Gen Intel Core i5-1135G7, Intel Iris Xe integrated graphics, 8 GB of RAM, and a 512 GB SSD. Not exactly high-end, which made Windows 11’s resource demands feel especially noticeable.
Why I Left Windows 11
The Performance Problem
The most immediate and frustrating issue was RAM usage. On idle, Windows 11 was consuming up to 7 GB of my 8 GB of RAM. On a machine with only 8 GB, that left virtually nothing for actual work. Having a few Chrome tabs open alongside Visual Studio Code was a genuine struggle. Multitasking felt like asking too much of a system that should, by all accounts, be able to handle it.
A Buggy, Fragmented OS
The early 2026 Windows updates made things significantly worse. The January and February 2026 updates introduced a wave of bugs that were widely reported and left unaddressed for far too long. Among the most common were telling Windows to shut down after an update only for it to restart instead, Wi-Fi adapters going missing entirely, black screens during boot, and Notepad failing to open. These problems reflect deeper stability concerns, surfacing across core components in ways that disrupt everyday use.
Beyond the bugs, Windows 11 has a deeper identity crisis with its UI. It is a patchwork of different design languages stitched together across decades. The modern Settings app sits alongside the classic Control Panel from older versions of Windows. The right-click context menu is a prime example of this regression. Microsoft buried the most-used options behind a "Show more options" click, adding an extra step to something you do dozens of times a day. Windows 11 also uses React for parts of its shell UI, and the result is a noticeably sluggish interface that feels resource-heavy for what it is actually doing.
Forced AI Everywhere
Microsoft's aggressive push of Copilot has become impossible to ignore. AI features have been pushed into Notepad, Paint, OneDrive in File Explorer, and seemingly every other corner of the OS whether you want them or not. The introduction of Microsoft Recall, a feature that continuously screenshots your activity, made it clear that Microsoft's priorities lie somewhere other than user privacy.
File Explorer also became increasingly unreliable. Search, one of the most basic OS features, is practically unusable. And if you uninstalled Copilot or OneDrive, neither of which you consented to installing in the first place, there was a real chance a future update would quietly reinstall them. For an OS you pay a licence fee for, shipping it with ads on the installation screen is hard to justify.
Privacy, Telemetry, and Local Accounts
Windows 11 is not open source. You have no visibility into what data is being collected or sent to Microsoft. The gradual removal of the local account option during setup makes this worse. Microsoft wants your account linked, which creates a persistent identity that can be tracked and fingerprinted. Telemetry is on by default and difficult to fully disable. For anyone who cares about privacy and data ownership, this is a dealbreaker.
Lack of Customisation and Character
Windows 11 has a corporate and generic feel to it. It has drifted far from what made Windows enjoyable, the personality it had in the Windows 7 and even Windows 10 era. Yes, there are third-party tools to work around most of these issues, but the fact that this is the default state of a modern operating system is telling. Windows has lost its way.
Why Linux and Why Fedora KDE Plasma
The Case for Linux
When it came to picking an alternative, the choice was between macOS and Linux. For me, it was not a hard decision. I care deeply about open source software: the transparency, the community, the philosophy. Linux ticks every box. No telemetry, no big tech tracking, better privacy by default, and you are in complete control of your system.
Linux also has a dramatically lower memory footprint. The OS itself idles at a fraction of what Windows uses, meaning the majority of your RAM is free for the applications you are actually running. On an 8 GB machine, this difference is significant.
Choosing a Linux Distribution
I had previous experience with Ubuntu, both in a dual-boot setup and at university. But Ubuntu has been drifting in a direction I am not comfortable with, especially with Snap packages being pushed over user preference and a general trajectory that feels too close to Microsoft's approach. I also have issues with GNOME, Ubuntu's default desktop environment. It has a macOS-like user interface that I do not enjoy, and it is less customisable than I would like.
What I wanted was a desktop that felt familiar, something closer to a Windows 10 layout, but with the flexibility to make it truly my own. KDE Plasma was the obvious answer. It is fast, highly customisable, and has a clean, intuitive layout that does not try to reinvent how a desktop should work.
For the distro itself, I wanted something that is bleeding edge but stable, shipping modern software quickly, but not at the cost of reliability. Fedora is exactly that. It ships newer kernels and software than many other distros while still feeling polished and dependable. Fedora also offers an official KDE Plasma spin, which made it a straightforward choice.
Installation
Creating the Bootable USB
Download the Fedora KDE Plasma ISO from the official Fedora website. Use Rufus on Windows to flash it to a USB drive. It is fast, simple, and reliable.
BIOS Configuration
Restart your machine and enter the BIOS, typically by pressing F2, F12, or Delete on boot depending on the manufacturer, or on Windows you can hold Shift while selecting Restart to access the advanced startup menu. Then you need to:
Disable Secure Boot (Fedora supports it, but turning it off can help avoid potential compatibility issues).
Move the USB drive to the top of the boot order.
Save and exit. Your machine should then boot from the USB into the Fedora live environment.
Installing to Disk
From the live environment, launch the installer. I chose to install Fedora to the full disk. After two years of dual-booting, I was ready to commit. Select your disk, confirm the partition layout, and proceed. You can also enable disk encryption during this step for added security. During setup, you create a local account, which is a refreshing change from being pushed into an online account.
Once the installation completes, shut down, remove the USB, and boot into your new Fedora installation.
Post-Installation Setup
The first thing to understand is that Linux is not a drop-in replacement for Windows. It is a different operating system with a different ecosystem, just as you would not expect macOS and Windows to be interchangeable. What follows is what I set up to make Fedora work the way I want it to.
System Update
Before anything else, update the system:
sudo dnf upgrade
This pulls in the latest packages, kernel updates, and security patches. It is the first thing worth doing on a fresh install.
Flatpak and Flathub
Fedora supports Flatpak out of the box, but adding Flathub gives you access to a much larger app catalogue:
flatpak remote-add --if-not-exists flathub https://dl.flathub.org/repo/flathub.flatpakrepo
This makes it much easier to install desktop apps in a clean and simple way.
Browser: Brave Origin
I switched to Brave Origin, the privacy-focused browser from Brave. It has been great so far, and I plan to write a comparison of Chrome vs Brave Origin in a future post.
curl -fsS https://dl.brave.com/install.sh | FLAVOR=origin CHANNEL=beta sh
Office Suite: OnlyOffice
Microsoft Office does not run natively on Linux, so I installed OnlyOffice as the closest open source alternative for Word, PowerPoint, and Excel-style work.
flatpak install flathub org.onlyoffice.desktopeditors
It handles Microsoft file formats well and feels familiar enough for day-to-day work.
Email Client: Thunderbird
For email, I installed Thunderbird. It is open source, reliable, and a better replacement for Outlook if you want a desktop email client without the extra Microsoft features and services.
flatpak install flathub org.mozilla.thunderbird_esr
LaTeX: TeX Live Full
Since I like using LaTeX for write-ups, academic writing, and similar work, having a full LaTeX setup was essential. Installing the full TeX Live scheme saves time later because you are much less likely to run into missing package issues when working on documents.
sudo dnf install texlive-scheme-full
Theming: Catppuccin Mocha
One of KDE Plasma's biggest strengths is how deeply you can customise it. I installed the Catppuccin Mocha theme because it looks clean, modern, and gives the desktop more personality.
git clone --depth=1 https://github.com/catppuccin/kde catppuccin-kde && cd catppuccin-kde
./install.sh
Follow the prompts in the install script to apply it to the KDE Plasma desktop.
Code Editor: Zed
I have been using Zed as my primary code editor. It is open source, written in Rust, and feels extremely fast. Startup time is near-instant, it handles files smoothly, and the editing experience feels more lightweight than VS Code. That said, VS Code is still very good and I still use it because of its extension ecosystem. Both are good tools, just with different strengths.
curl -f https://zed.dev/install.sh | sh
Notes: Obsidian
For notes and knowledge management, I installed Obsidian. Obsidian stores everything locally in Markdown files, which fits perfectly with the privacy-first direction of moving to Linux.
flatpak install flathub md.obsidian.Obsidian
Password Manager: Bitwarden
Bitwarden is my password manager of choice. It is open source, cross-platform, and works well across desktop and browser environments.
flatpak install flathub com.bitwarden.desktop
Media Codecs, FFmpeg, and VLC
Fedora does not ship with some proprietary media codecs by default because of licensing reasons. To get proper multimedia support, I enabled RPM Fusion and installed VLC:
su -
dnf install https://download1.rpmfusion.org/free/fedora/rpmfusion-free-release-$(rpm -E %fedora).noarch.rpm
dnf install https://download1.rpmfusion.org/nonfree/fedora/rpmfusion-nonfree-release-$(rpm -E %fedora).noarch.rpm
dnf install vlc
dnf install python-vlc
Once RPM Fusion is enabled, you can also install FFmpeg and other useful multimedia packages.
After the Switch
The difference has been significant. Fedora KDE Plasma has solved most of the problems I was facing with Windows 11.
RAM usage is dramatically lower, which means there is finally room for actual applications and proper multitasking.
Everything feels faster and more responsive, from opening apps to browsing files.
Dolphin, the KDE file manager, is quick and search actually works.
There is no bloat on install, so the system feels clean from the start.
Wi-Fi works reliably.
There is no forced Copilot integration or AI being pushed into basic apps.
Most updates are straightforward with
sudo dnf upgrade && flatpak update, and they rarely require a restart.I get a local account, more privacy, no telemetry, and no cloud storage tied directly into the file system.
Linux takes up less storage space, which leaves more room for applications and personal files.
KDE Plasma is highly customisable and gives the desktop actual personality.
The switch does require some adjustment. Not every Windows application runs on Linux, and there is a learning curve around package managers, desktop environments, and terminal commands. But for the way I work, which is mostly coding, writing, research, and general productivity, Fedora KDE Plasma handles everything I need without getting in the way.
If you are on a mid-range or older machine being dragged down by Windows 11, Linux is worth serious consideration. Fedora KDE Plasma has been a great fit for me because it feels modern, stable, lightweight, and genuinely enjoyable to use.
