Pop!_OS

Raised as a usability problem by 76 people on Hacker News over 9 years (2018–2026), in 55 threads.

People raised many different problems with Pop!_OS, but no single problem has yet been raised by 3 people in 3 different months and threads.

Unreviewed issues were grouped by machine: Claude Haiku labelled each comment as a usability complaint, named what it's about and summed up the problem in a line, and a small model grouped similar problems. Nobody has checked them by hand. Expect mistakes.

The newest 50 complaints

Can't find shortcut to cycle between instances of the same application2026-07-23
Can't figure out shortcut to switch between instances of same program2026-03-02
Touch input lacks auto virtual keyboard and system icons open no menu on tap2025-12-16
Iced fork was so slow it wasn't production ready2025-12-08
After boot failure, confusing systemd errors left user unable to fix it2025-12-01
Needed drivers and configuration before games ran at first boot2025-11-30
No clock, notifications or app indicators on non-primary monitors; top bar only on main display2025-09-26
Full screen app on main screen hides the clock and top bar2025-09-26
Fullscreen apps hide the clock, so users must exit to see time2025-09-26
Doesn't handle multiple monitors gracefully; top-bar fails to render some app icons2025-09-26
Accidental key combination turns on screen reader voicing every key, annoying kid2025-09-26
Bundled app store is annoying, though optional2025-09-26
Super+arrow switches apps instead of moving cursor, and the option to disable it is hard to find2025-09-26
Having to stop work to check the time2025-09-26
Apps show a mix of big and small font sizes, making the desktop look inconsistent2025-08-16
Getting Windows software running through Lutris/Wine is a pain and sometimes stops working2025-04-02
Spent two days failing to get Steam to display at correct scale2024-09-30
Hiding the top bar requires GNOME Toolkit and doesn't work reliably2024-08-28
Installer could not use an existing /home partition when first tried2024-05-29
Significant UI lag, jank and bugs even with NVidia drivers installed2024-03-16
HDMI monitor is sometimes not detected, must switch to DisplayPort2024-01-13
Feels sluggish and slow on older machines, using excess idle memory2024-01-03
Common window actions need a special layout mode instead of a single key chord2023-10-22
Screen doesn't turn black on lock; monitors stay half awake all night2023-10-22
After locking, external monitors stay half-awake and must be unplugged overnight2023-10-22
Forced dark theme makes several apps partly illegible and hard to fix2023-10-05
GNOME 3 interface still has usability problems the commenter finds hard to live with2023-06-08
Can't figure out how to move multiple stacked windows to a new location at once2023-06-02
Confusing to tell whether a package is a Flatpak or a regular package2023-04-22
Can't set different wallpapers on two monitors without editing an image in GIMP2023-04-03
Couldn't figure out how to upgrade OS despite lots of command line effort2023-01-12
Hard to configure, so the user prefers plain Debian despite setup pain2022-10-22
Machine stalls at boot with error spam, leaving user at an unclear prompt2022-10-22
Had trouble upgrading the OS and needed support help to finish2022-10-03
Setting up NextDNS took two hours of wrestling with systemd2022-09-12
No UI option to change mouse acceleration, so it required obscure config file edits2022-07-09
Cannot run the system updater while the linux-surface PPA is active2022-06-25
Installing another desktop environment like XFCE breaks the system2022-04-26
Enabling hibernation on encrypted Pop!_OS install is a pain due to partition scheme2022-03-26
A recent update broke the dock and launcher, making the machine unusable for days2022-03-11
Launcher now opens to a different first screen instead of the user's curated app list2022-01-16
Terminal copy and paste shortcuts become error-prone and inconsistent after remapping Control to Super2022-01-16
Selecting text in address bar copies it instead of the wanted text2022-01-15
Keyboard shortcut customization never gave the commenter the behavior they wanted2022-01-15
Middle-click paste conflicts with TrackPoint scrolling, and terminal uses different copy-paste keys2022-01-15
Two-finger swipe cannot be configured for browser back and forward navigation2022-01-15
Missing address bar makes copying paths and navigating up directories harder2022-01-15
Switching desktops without rebooting causes odd dbus problems and conflicting login sessions2022-01-15
Fractional scaling is a mess, and integer scaling is not much better2021-12-16
Driver upgrade made system unusably slow; downgrading required hacks due to dependency removal2021-12-15