Repeat after me: it’s not only about installing, but also about maintaining your system!

I agree with the OP. But swap the term “newbie” for “casual user” or “non IT user”, and more people would agree. Even the nerdiest IT Pro was a newbie whenever they use a distro for the first time. Avoid the term “normie” too, as people have different ideas of what normal is. There are more non IT, power users who have a deep knowledge of their applications, than all Linux users put together.

So this discussion is all around a sloppy choice of terminology.

Most desktop computer users want a system that works out of the box, never breaks, and hides away the complexity behind a “we’re doing magic under the scenes, give us a second” style screen.

And it appears that some distros, like Ubuntu, Mint, and PopOS, ElementaryOS, and ZorinOS, have either outright achieved this lofty goal or gotten very close (I am on Artix and haven’t used these for any considerable amount of time but from the outside it looks like they’ve done so).

From my limited perspective, it appears the main reason behind noob friendly distros being even possible is the long release cycle of their base distro, Debian. Thusly configuration scripts for these variants are easier to upkeep than on Arch based distros because there simply isn’t this rapid fire bleeding edge schedule that needs to be kept up on Debian.

I’m not opposed to recommending Arch for computer savvy noobs to Linux, even those that aren’t necessarily familiar with the command line. As long as they show a genuine willingness to learn it over time. Especially if they want to be an engineer/ developer of any kind, they should become familiar with the command line regardless of which OS they use.

But if they’re a normie, who just wants to try Linux because they’re tired of MacOS or Windows and just want a simple OS that they can use for basic office tasks, browsing the web, answering emails, playing video games, watching videos, etc., then don’t send them down the Arch rabbit hole. They’ll simply not want to spend the time figuring it out and they’ll just go back to Windows or MacOS. Recommend they try ElementaryOS, Linux Mint, Ubuntu, ZorinOS, or PopOS depending on their use case.

Arch requires constant maintenance and a bit of discernment/vigilence to keep going and that’s something most users aren’t willing to go through.

It’s like getting people to learn how to drive vs becominng your own mechanic. Sure, people are willing to learn to drive, they can immediately see the value in it, they want to get to places and have their own autonomy. But Arch is becoming your own mechanic (with Gentoo being like also being your own machinist). Most people don’t want to be their own mechanic, most of the time they just want to drive from point A to point B.

I have heard good things about Mabox linux, although it’s based on manjaro.

Alternatively one could also try ‘Arco linux’ it’s pretty good.

Artix should be mostly good for even new users, just look past the whole init system thing

My experience is that arch isn’t for the first time users (with rare exceptions). I think that Arch is the ‘wrenchable car’ equivalent.

When a is person learning how to drive the aim isn’t to immediately train them on how to do mechanical work on the car… It’s to learn how to make it do its primary task of transporting people and goods.

Once they have basic competency in driving it’s a laudable idea to teach then how to maintain the vehicle so they don’t have to spend a large amount of money on experts (mechanics, IT). If the only vehicles they ever drive are super complex then they won’t be able to understand how it works. This is where the ‘wrenchable car’ comes in. Choosing a vehicle that has manageable complexity and isn’t hard to do the work on.

Arch requires you to assemble the system as part of the installation. The documentation is fantastic, but it’s still written like a service manual. Arch also does poorly if you fail to do maintenance like keeping updated. Choosing a more beginner-focused OS like Pop or Mint is going to set a new user who doesn’t have any understanding up for more likely success. Once they know how to get the system out of park and can drive it around the digital block, it might be time to show them how to build that self-assemble kit that lets you change the color of the dash lights.

Arch happened to be the final step I needed to walk away from windows, but that came after flirting with various distributions for more than a decade. One of those attempts was Gentoo, and that was a disaster. I don’t think that I would have been successful if I had tried arch much earlier than I did.

@squid_slime but it is a pretty bad experience for them I use it just for hyprland and that’s not what most new users want to see they just want a system that just works