Linux gaming is almost there, but 3 missing pieces keep me booting into Windows

Published May 15, 2026, 12:30 PM EDT After a 7-year corporate stint, Tanveer found his love for writing and tech too much to resist. An MBA in Marketing and the owner of a PC building business, he writes on PC hardware, technology, and Windows. When not scouring the web for ideas, he can be found building PCs, watching anime, or playing Smash Karts on his RTX 3080 (sigh). I have always been a Windows guy ever since I started using Windows 98 back in 2000. I didn't even know Linux was a thing when I was a kid. Even when I found out about gaming on Linux, its reputation for being too technical and niche kept me safely in the arms of Microsoft's walled garden. Fast-forward to 2026, and I was finally looking for a replacement for Windows 10. I didn't want to jump to Windows 11, so I began the search for a Linux distro that I could use every day. I liked a lot of things about Bazzite, but it only got me to around 80–90% of the way. I still found myself keeping my Windows installation alive for times when Bazzite underperformed, didn't support the title I wanted to play, or threw a tantrum that I was too tired to address. Linux gaming is in a golden era right now, but it's still not ready to welcome the average gamer who doesn't want to think about their OS at all. Related Bazzite is what most Linux gaming distros wish they were Choose Bazzite if you want a console-like experience on Linux Proton offers 90% game compatibility, but that 10% still hurts Linux can't cheat its way around anti-cheat Valve's relentless work on Proton, the translation layer enabling Windows games to run on Linux, has been nothing short of phenomenal. Even four years ago, you couldn't predict the state of Linux gaming that gamers are enjoying today. SteamOS on the Steam Deck paved the way for the current popularity of Linux as a viable platform for gaming. The three-pronged foundation of Proton, Vulkan, and Mesa that is keeping Linux gaming alive has given birth to several distros that offer a great gaming experience. You can take your pick from Bazzite, CachyOS, Nobara, Fedora, and many other fantastic options that have gotten good enough to play 90% of your Windows game library. That's the thing, though — that remaining 10% gap is bigger than it looks. Since Linux still doesn't have kernel-level anti-cheat support, some of the most popular multiplayer titles are conspicuously absent from the platform. Titles like Battlefield 6, Call of Duty: Black Ops 7, Valorant, and League of Legends may not be what I play every day, but when I need to join an occasional session with my friends on the weekend, I'm forced to go back to Windows. The list of games not supported by Linux isn't limited to these titles, either. Any future game in the CoD or Battlefield franchises will likely face the same fate. Then, there's the issue of worse-than-Windows performance in a handful of demanding AAA titles. They might be few and far between, but the result is the same: I need to keep my Windows 10 copy alive. Even some native Linux ports suffer from bad performance compared to their Windows versions. I may be able to play Cyberpunk 2077, Elden Ring, Doom, and GTFO on Bazzite just fine, but sooner or later, I have to come back to Windows 10 to enjoy a multiplayer title by EA, Activision, or Riot. Linux can run most of my PC games, often with better performance than Windows. Until the anti-cheat elephant on Linux is gone, though, it will always be easier to just stay on Windows for everything rather than keep two operating systems on your system. Bazzite Related Linux gaming is "solved" until anti-cheat shows up Linux and third-party anti-cheat clients are like water and oil I don't want to run alternatives to companion software I'm just too used to things on Windows Games aren't the only things I run on a gaming PC. I also need my suite of software to run like a well-oiled machine, supporting undervolting, overlays, upscaling features, and voice chat. Unfortunately, many of the programs I've been using for years on Windows don't have Linux versions. MSI Afterburner, RTSS, and the Nvidia app are just a few of the things I miss on Linux. I know that alternatives exist to achieve similar results, but when you're used to a certain way of doing things, you don't want to disrupt it, especially when it's just easy to stay on Windows full-time. Microsoft's OS might not be perfect, but it feels like home. After all, I've only used Windows on my PC for nearly 30 years. Even other programs like Discord and Special K often suffer from crashes, bugs, and Proton version incompatibilities. Linux has surpassed 5% market share for the first time, but the average PC user still prefers the superior compatibility of Windows. Related I don't want to worry about distros, Proton versions, or driver mismatch It can quickly get overwhelming The most obvious reason keeping me from switching to Linux is not the game or software support; it's the fact that I have to "manage" my OS. Even when I'm using an immutable distro like Bazzite, there's no guarantee that it won't throw the occasional surprise my way. I still need to be ready for a Proton version mismatch, inferior driver performance, or the distro itself being the wrong choice. When I'm on Windows, I can still run into performance or compatibility issues, but they're easy enough to solve. Linux still requires a fair amount of elbow grease, which I haven't gotten comfortable with yet. Most PC gamers don't want to actively think about their OS; they just want something that disappears into the background. Linux does this on the Steam Deck, but in the form of SteamOS. That expectation is not met when you run a distro on a desktop. Diagnosing problems to make sure games and programs run properly can sometimes get too taxing. Linux still needs me to spend hours figuring out why stuff breaks the way it does, and apply a patch to get it to work again. After a long day, I'm rarely in the mood to do that. When I think about the advantages of gaming on Linux versus the effort it asks of me, I lean heavily in favor of Windows, even if I have to accept slightly inferior gaming performance. Linux gaming is bound to grow more welcoming for the average user, especially after the launch of the Steam Machine. However, as things stand today, Linux might be the biggest reason gamers are not ready to switch to Linux. Related Linux gaming still has a long way to go When we're talking about convincing Windows gamers to switch to Linux, the benefits of the latter aren't enough. The downsides deserve an equal amount of discourse. After all, Linux is competing against three decades of Microsoft's close relationship with developers and hardware manufacturers. It won't be easy to capture a significant market share against that domination. We need to talk in terms of decades, not years, when speaking about the rise of Linux as a major gaming platform.