Where To Find Programs & Applications

You may be enjoying the free & open source operating system, but the programs are what you'll be working with the most. This article serves as a collection of strategies & resources for you to find your next favorite set of apps.

Take Back Our Tech

22 Jul 2021

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1. Use The Application Store

The easiest way to find applications would be to use the built-in application store. For most operating systems you can simply press the Windows / Meta key and get a look at the featured programs in the OS specific repository.

Pop!_OS: Pop Shop
KDE Neon: Discover
Linux Mint: Software Manager

Finding Applications On The Pop!_OS Pop Shop

2. Search or Look At The Ubuntu Repository

The three operating systems we recommended (KDE Neon, Pop!_OS, and Linux Mint) are pre-configured to download from Ubuntu's software repository, which contains thousands of different programs that are optimized and tested for Ubuntu based systems.

Since we are using an operating system based on Ubuntu 21.04, we will have access to the entire package (program) archive.

Here's all the packages available in Ubuntu, grouped by sections

Ubuntu – List of sections in “hirsute”

Packages grouped by their sections!

3. Search through the AppImage Hub

AppImages are a breeze to work with, and you can find up to a thousand AppImage applications on AppImageHub.

www.appimagehub.com

A community where developers and artists share applications, themes and other content

www.appimagehub.com

4. Search through Flathub

Flatpak applications are also incredibly easy to install, and you can find thousands of applications and install them with one command on Flathub, the official Flatpak repository.

Flathub—An app store and build service for Linux

Find and install hundreds of apps and games for Linux. Enjoy GIMP, GNU Octave, Spotify, Steam and many more!

5. Search For Your Favorite Applications Online

With the rising popularity of Linux, chances are the applications you use everyday are available on Linux. Although we recommend you stick to free & open-source applications, there is also plenty of proprietary applications available (Google Chrome, Spotify, Skype). The level of data collection cannot be verified for any of these proprietary applications.

You can start by searching your favorite application on a search engine and see if it is available for Linux.

Typically, the Linux installer would be on the downloads page for the application. Be sure to pay extra attention to the installation format (.AppImage, .deb). Read our article on installing applications for more information.

6. Search For Alternatives

If you're unable to find your favorite application on Linux, then you may be able to find an even better alternative.

AlternativeTo

AlternativeTo is a great resource, simply plug in the name of an application you want an alternative to, and then filter by the Linux Platform and an open-source license.