Basically, which linux distro is the best for a non-power user? Someone who wants to be able to get up and running without having to learn how to manage the OS using the cli.
Quick example: When I install a new OS, the first thing I want to do is install Brave. That should be as easy as "click on this thing, type in brave, select Brave, install."
Offtopic, but I'd steer clear of brave. They feel scammy, have crypto built in and replace ads with their own. Since it's built on chromium it just adds to the market share of chromium and towards a Google controlled internet.
Alas, we have reached a point where lots of web stuff already just does not work in non chromium browsers. My father could not use Netflix on Firefox on Linux mint, we called Netflix customer support and they said to install Google chrome. And it then worked.
I use opera and it worked for me too.
So a chromium browser is needed, for streaming stuff at least. And non googled chromium probably does not have the commercial addons needed.
What would be the least bad chromium family browser then ?
No idea if any one is less bad from a FOSS, ethical or ideological perspective, but personally I like Vivaldi. I switched back to Firefox for ideological reasons though.
I second LinuxMint. When I first got in to linux I was (shamefully 😅) looking for something that was as close as possible to Windows and a turn key experience with both installation and app compatibility. Linux mint was what I settled on personally.
I think opinionated is different from being for a non-power-user.
Click 'brave' is not opinionated, because I could click chromium instead. "There is a web browser (and it is Firefox)" is more opinionated, and easier at first, then harder if you happen to need a chromium-based browser.
It's not crypto mining, because crypto mining is basically worthless on consumer hardware now. What it does is run its own ads and pay you for enduring them and being spied upon by them in its own cryptocurrency.
It is a brazilian distro semi-famous here, continuously developed by more or less a small team since 20 years, but with support for 29 languages including english.
they use a base of Manjaro Linux KDE, which is based on Arch. They install via Calamares, and you select the desktop configuration (windows-like, macoss-like, etc of 6 options).
The motto for the distro is : “In search of the perfect system”, and their goal is more or less to make a linux distro the MOST complete and beginner-friendly possible, sort of going in a Maximalist, anti-gnome philosophy. For this, they have:
Pre-packaged lots and lots of programs out-of-the-box (like rustdesk, both brave and firefox, steam, lutris, jdownloader, corestats, a printscreen program, image sound video converters, etc and 2 whole sections of Webbapps (including all of google stuff - docs, slides, maps - , almost all social media sites, microsoft office, all music streaming and television streaming sites → and you can disable them on the webbapp hub).
The only linux distro i found that out-of-the-box installs ALL packaging methods (i.e. ALL OF THEM). They natively have BigLinux and Manjaro repositories, AUR, Flatpak and Snap (snap is activated by the user clicking in a button, so you can have it or not). They have integration for .appimage, automatic converter for .deb and .rpm installation, java installed and ready to run .jar programs, and Waydroid (for android apps).
I know it is possible to do this on mostly any distro, but trying doing that as a noob was unsuccesful for me, i did not know the names of all little programs (or that they existed) , and is a lot of time and pain, this way it really just works.
The software store is great (Big Store), it is completely visual interface, you just type the name of the program, click a button, write the password, and it instals, and again, it has BigLinux and Manjaro repositories, AUR, Flatpak and Snap to search. You can just search on the internet for the other packages, download the .deb .rpm .appimage .apk file, and just click, and it converts and instals them. I never have to worry about linux apps not being compatible for instalation on my distro, ever.
All in all, a truly graphical user interface, out-of-the-box functionality and beginner friendly distro. With the security of manjaro, and the bleedging edge of Arch.
Negative point is that it both uses KDE and has a ton of programs pre-installed , so it leans heavy. I could not install it on a 2006 toshiba laptop even the light version, but a 2011 Macbook with ssd runs great. I use it on a Sony vaio 8gb ram 2013 all in one and have no complaints.
It tries to make things similar to Windows (which most people are accustomed to due to school), and also has its own set of apps that try to make things as simple as possible by having simple names so people know what to expect.
Quick example: When I install a new OS, the first thing I want to do is install Brave. That should be as easy as “click on this thing, type in brave, select Brave, install.”
Why would you expect that from Linux, that's not even how it works on Windows lol. Basically every Linux distro comes with a software center these days, so that shouldn't be a concern.
Someone who wants to be able to get up and running without having to learn how to manage the OS using the cli.
Your usage of the CLI will be determined by how much stuff you want to do. If all you want to do is use a browser, than any distro will work. If you are a techie that uses a bunch of peripherals and like the latest greatest hardware, I would recommend Endeavor because your hardware will be better supported and installing drivers from the AUR is easy. If you are OK with a slight learning curve with the benefit of having a stable distro you don't have to mess with, I would recommend Fedora Silverblue or Kinoite.
As others have said, Ubuntu is great for non-technical users. The only issue I could forsee is drivers. Apt loves to brick itself after 1 mistake. Since apt lags behind it may not support new hardware, forcing you to download drivers elsewhere, which is a recipe for disaster.