[fl4regun]

So can anyone give me a short explanation on why someone would use freeBSD over linux? I do run it technically, on my router (OPNSense), but that's not a personal computer, like a desktop or laptop. What are the advantages to running FreeBSD?

[kev009]

For the average joe there it's just an option and personal taste, and it comes with its own tradeoffs and learning curve. Well integrated ZFS would probably be the main thing for average joe.

For developers, it is interesting to think of as a self contained toolkit. If you are building firmware, platform images for bare metal or cloud, it creates a much better demarcation than any attempts Linux can put forth. This is related to why you might like OPNSense. But if you are just a consumer it only indirectly matters to you.. consistency of build and product, quality of subset of network drivers and subsystems like pf to support your mission, ability go in and quickly and correctly fix the right problem at the right level etc.

[herecomesthepre]

If you want ZFS use Solaris not an ersatz system that imported OpenZFS code.

[sausagefeet]

I have a few reasons:

1. I subjectively just like it better. Things like dtrace, jails, the init system, just click for me.

2. I think it's good to not support a Linux mono-culture. Yes, there is Windows and macOS, but in terms of open source OS's, I think it's good to have more than one choice and so for any rough edges in FreeBSD, I'm willing to deal with them to support that goal.

3. I don't think you'll find any actual, hard, technical reason to want to prefer FreeBSD over Linux on a desktop. Anything you can do in FreeBSD you can do in Linux. Heck, FreeBSD is probably even running the Linux version (for example video drivers).

But really, which Linux do you mean? Nix? Gentoo? Red Hat?

[fl4regun]

I use arch, but I don't see the distro as mattering that much. For the most part it just feels like picking your poison on which init system, what package manager you want to use, etc, but the end experience isn't too different once everything is set up. I can run steam on each one, they all have gcc, they all have support for the same set of desktop environments, they all have chrome/ff/whatever browser you want. At this point I'm just using what I have set up because the setup is what takes most of the effort, once that's done, it's smooth sailing.

[jmspring]

CUDA gets into an area that I wouldn't use it for. My local LLM machine is running Void linux.

[josephg]

Yes; linux is generally supported better than freebsd. CUDA and Docker work out of the box on linux. Linux has better graphics drivers and steam support. Opensource software (libraries, tools) are much more likely to be tested & work properly on linux. I've also run into several rust crates which don't build on freebsd - particularly crates which depend on C code.

But the comment you're replying to said there weren't many good technical reasons to prefer freebsd over linux. I think that's broadly true.

I still really like freebsd though. Unlike linux, one community is responsible for the kernel and userspace. That makes the whole OS feel much more cohesive. You don't have to worry about supporting 18 different distributions, which all do their own thing.

[jmspring]

FreeBSD's development philosophy, it's aversion to design decisions like - we must allow systemd everywhere, stability, zfs and jails, consistent configuration (for decades) are all technical reasons I prefer it over Linux.

How about Ubuntu and snaps? License needed for certain security updates, etc.

[eugenekay]

FreeBSD will never switch to systemd. :-)

It is an old-school UNIX experience, not great for desktops but excellent for long-lived “pet servers” where long-term stability over decades of service is valued. I treasure it for running small Web servers and shell hosts, instead of Debian/Ubuntu.

[icedchai]

Same. I've been running it on a "pet" server since the mid 90's, for shell, web, email, etc. I started on FreeBSD 2.x and has been through many upgrades and migrations! I also worked at an early ISP and FreeBSD was our go-to for email, NNTP, and DNS.

[unethical_ban]

It's different than Linux, and mainstream enough to be actively developed and used in production. For a hobbyist, that is useful in itself.

It's a pretty rock-solid system, from my memory of the 2000s.

BSDs in general are tightly integrated between kernel and userland tools. FreeBSD has a lot of modern concepts built in that Linux also has, such as Jails and bhyve VM hosting.

FreeBSD has ZFS has a first-class citizen and in my sysadmin opinion, ZFS is one of the best filesystems ever created. While others dunk on BSD for "catching up to Linux" on certain features, BSD equivalents seem to be really well architected. ZFS is one place where Linux (btrfs) is only beginning to catch up. I just learned about bectl (Boot Environment Ctl) that makes snapshotting and rolling back the system partition of installs really easy, and ZFS-on-root is critical to that tool.

For many, having the simple RC init system is a boon over systemd. Services that need started up at boot are defined in /etc/rc.conf, as well as networking and other core services. Editing rc.conf can be done manually or with the sysrc tool.

[sellmesoap]

Some may call me a devil's advocate (I love FreeBSD as my first alternate OS, it's more sensible as a whole, and less chaotic then linux) it provided the network stack for Microsoft and a base for darwin (OSX) Maybe it's just the low brow art, maybe it's the root of evil and the label is on the tin, how cute!

[jmspring]

Stability and security. It's a great server OS and I've been using it for decades.

[assimpleaspossi]

Use Google and you will find your same question has been asked 1000x1000 times every day for 30 years.

[mghackerlady]

it's just a good unix experience, some people like that

[herecomesthepre]

It's arguably the best non-Apple/non-Windows system to use to order an Apple or Windows laptop to replace it.

You might have to use an Ethernet connection though, as the Wi-Fi may not be supported.