Many of us don’t know that there are several Linux apps that are freely available. They are must-have software that a Linux user should install on his PC.
However, nowadays user-friendly Linux distros come with a set of applications pre-installed in it, there are many amazing Linux software that can uplift your Linux experience. Because we don’t want you to search for them, we have compiled a list of the 11 best desktop apps for linux users. These programs are installed via a graphical frontend like Synaptic or command line on your favorite Linux distro.
11 Best Linux Software You Should Download: –
1. VLC Media Player
VLC is one of the best Linux software that can do much more than just playing music or movies. Right when it is installed, it downloads codecs for every kind of audio or video file that reduces the playback issues significantly. To your surprise, this software can also play DVDs.
VLC media player can also be used to clip video files and convert them from one format to another i.e., AVI to MP4, etc. Moreover, you can even stream media from one device to another.
2. GIMP
GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program) is a free image editor that can be used to edit and retouch images by resizing, adding layers and other special effects, which can be accessed via the handy toolbox or dropdown menus. If you are new to this editing tool, then you can check out the GIMP website for tutorials.
At first, you might find the GIMP interface a bit tricky to understand but you would eventually be able to get hold of the tools with practice. You can even add Adobe Photoshop plugins to GIMP for editing the images. One of the biggest advantages of this tool is that it takes up less than 100MB of space, which is beneficial when you are short on space. It is definitely one of the best Linux software you’ll ever come across.
3. Mozilla Firefox
Firefox is available as a default web browser for a number of Linux distros such as Ubuntu and Linux Mint. For other Linux distros, you can experience a simple and fluid interface that makes mozilla Firefox user-friendly and accessible.
With Firefox, you can play YouTube videos right off the bat, and can also download plugins to play other formats for you. The browser comes with an auto-updation feature thus you will always have the latest version working for you.
Firefox supports a number of extensions to enhance your web experience, and can be customised further via the Mozilla add-ons page, where it is possible to install a colourful theme. Firefox is one of the best Linux apps that should be installed on your PC.
4. Synaptic
Linux distros such as Ubuntu come with flashy app stores, but none of them is as quick and easy to use as Synaptic. Considered as one of the best Linux apps, Synaptic provides a graphical frontend for the ‘apt-get’ command line utility. It can be installed on any Debian-based Linux distro such as Ubuntu or Linux Mint.
You can browse categories of apps using the pane present on the left-hand side. Click the box next to an app name to mark it for installation (or uninstallation) then click the Apply button at the top to make changes in the features.
5. uGet
uGet is one of the best Linux software that lets you quickly download apps your desktop. It is open source and has all the features that you would expect from a download manager with advanced settings. Some of its features include queuing and resuming downloads, use of multiple connections for downloading large files, downloading files to different directories according to categories among others.
6. Deluge
Deluge is a lightweight and fully-featured app for Linux operating system for downloading your files. It has a user-friendly interface which is easy to master and can be enhanced by a number of excellent community supported plugins that offer features such as shutting down your machine when a download completes. These features makes it one of the best Linux apps you should certainly download.
You can even set up Deluge in a way such that it can be accessed via a web interface from other devices, thus allowing you to download files to your home computer when you’re away.
7. LibreOffice
LibreOffice offers a full-blown office suite and is a good alternative to commercial alternatives like Microsoft Office. It comes with a basic interface but has a lot of advanced features that make it efficient.
The LibreOffice word processor Writer, spreadsheet software Calc and presentation app Impress comes pre-installed in Ubuntu and most of its derivatives. The suite also includes three less well-known apps – Draw, Math and Base – which are used for editing vector graphics, composing mathematical formulae and managing databases respectively.
LibreOffice uses the ODF (Open Document Format) by default but files compatible with Microsoft Office can also be opened and save in it.
8. Thunderbird
Thunderbird is a free and powerful email client, which is also considered as one of the best Linux apps. When you are starting off with it, the setup wizard would guide you through the process of either creating a new email address or setting up your existing one. Thunderbird’s database contains email settings for all common providers, and you can add as many email accounts as you require.
Just like Firefox, Thunderbird can also be enhanced by add-ons, such as themes to make it more colourful, or ways to sort your Mail folders. The most useful of the available features is the Lightning extension which adds a fully functioning Calendar to the email client.
9. Pidgin
Pidgin is one of the best Linux software that allows you to connect to multiple chat networks at once. Sadly, Facebook chat is no longer available for this feature since the social network dropped support for the open XMPP messaging protocol.
Pidgin can be made more efficient by installing third-party plugins. Some of these allow you to connect to other chat networks such as Skype, while others can be used to protect your conversations, such as the OTR (Off the Record) messaging plugin.
10. Lollypop
This is a new addition to the category of music players on the app store. Lollypop is open source and comes with a beautiful yet simple user interface. It comes with features such as music organizer, scrobbling support, online radio, and a party mode which can be set up according to your preference. It has several advanced features as well, which makes it worthy to be included in the list of best Linux apps.
11. ClamAV/ClamTk
There might be cases when your PC can accidentally forward harmful files to other computers, through an email attachment. To curb such an issue, the antivirus scanner ClamAV provides excellent features for detecting different types of malware. It is commonly used on mail servers but can also run on your desktop system if you want to scan files or folders. By default, ClamAV can only be used from the command line, but you can use Synaptic to install ‘clamtk’ and ‘clamtk-nautilus’ which allows you to scan your system and individual files with just a few clicks of your mouse.
Over and out, these are the 11 must-have Linux software for your PC. They have different utilities and will help in all basic processes performed on PC. Please share your experience in the comments section below.