--- title: Gentoo Reviews meta_title: 'Gentoo Reviews 2026: Details, Pricing, & Features | G2' meta_description: Filter 38 reviews by the users' company size, role or industry to find out how Gentoo works for a business like yours. aggregate_rating: rating_value: 4.1 review_count: 38 scale: '5' date_modified: '2026-06-25' parent_category: name: IT Infrastructure url: https://www.g2.com/categories/it-infrastructure --- # Gentoo Reviews **Vendor:** Gentoo Linux **Category:** [Operating Systems](https://www.g2.com/categories/operating-system) **Average Rating:** 4.1/5.0 **Total Reviews:** 38 ## About Gentoo Gentoo Linux is a free, source-based operating system that emphasizes configurability and performance. Utilizing the Portage package management system, Gentoo allows users to compile software directly from source code, enabling optimization tailored to specific hardware and application needs. This approach grants users unparalleled control over their system's configuration, making Gentoo a versatile choice for a wide range of applications, from secure servers to gaming systems. Key Features and Functionality: - Portage Package Management: Gentoo's Portage system facilitates the compilation of software from source, allowing for extensive customization and optimization. - USE Flags: This feature enables users to specify desired functionalities for each package, providing fine-grained control over software features and dependencies. - Rolling Release Model: Gentoo follows a rolling release model, ensuring that users have continuous access to the latest software updates and security patches without the need for major system upgrades. - Wide Architecture Support: Gentoo is compatible with a broad range of processor architectures, including x86, x86-64, ARM, PowerPC, and more, enhancing its adaptability across diverse hardware platforms. Primary Value and User Solutions: Gentoo's primary value lies in its flexibility and performance optimization capabilities. By compiling software from source, users can tailor their systems to meet specific performance requirements and hardware configurations. This level of customization is particularly beneficial for advanced users and developers who require a high degree of control over their operating environment. Additionally, Gentoo's rolling release model ensures that systems remain up-to-date with the latest software advancements and security updates, reducing the need for frequent, large-scale system upgrades. ## Gentoo Pros & Cons **What users like:** - Users love the **customization options** of Gentoo, enabling a tailored system for optimal performance and specific needs. (4 reviews) - Users commend Gentoo for its **exceptional speed and performance** , allowing precise optimization tailored to individual hardware needs. (2 reviews) - Users value the **knowledgeable community support** of Gentoo, which helps tailor systems to their specific needs. (1 reviews) - Users find Gentoo's **ease of use** beneficial, but it is best suited for those with Linux experience. (1 reviews) - Users appreciate the **unparalleled hardware support** of Gentoo, allowing for optimal performance tailored to their needs. (1 reviews) - Users admire the **flexibility and performance** of Gentoo, but it suits only the tech-savvy due to complexity. (1 reviews) - Users value Gentoo for its **customizable performance** , allowing builds tailored to specific needs through use of flags. (1 reviews) - Stability (1 reviews) **What users dislike:** - Users find the **installation difficulties** of Gentoo challenging due to its complexity and steep learning curve. (5 reviews) - Users find the **skill requirements** of Gentoo challenging, needing significant time and technical knowledge for setup and updates. (2 reviews) - Users find the **time-consuming setup** of Gentoo challenging, requiring significant investment in installation and maintenance. (2 reviews) - Users find the **slow update process** of Gentoo frustrating, requiring significant time and effort for maintenance. (1 reviews) - Users find the **usage difficulty** of Gentoo challenging due to tedious installation and a steep learning curve. (1 reviews) ## Gentoo Reviews ### 1. Great Linux Distro **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Bret B. | Senior Full-Stack Engineer, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** September 30, 2025 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** As a senior software engineer, I’ve found Gentoo Linux to be an exceptional choice for certain types of development environments, particularly when low-level performance tuning and full system transparency are crucial. The source-based approach, paired with Portage and USE flags, gives me fine-grained control over dependencies, compiler optimizations, and runtime configurations. This has proven invaluable when building minimal containers, cross-compiling for embedded systems, or maintaining a consistent toolchain across projects. Gentoo forces you to understand what’s actually going on under the hood—something that aligns well with the demands of production-level software engineering. One of the most significant advantages for professional use is the ability to precisely manage system state and dependencies, which makes debugging and performance profiling far more predictable. For example, I can tailor the build of a language runtime or database system to exclude unnecessary modules, reducing overhead and simplifying the deployment footprint. The fact that everything is compiled from source also makes it easier to apply upstream patches or custom modifications without waiting on distro maintainers. Gentoo doesn’t abstract things away—it exposes everything, which can be a double-edged sword, but for me, that’s a feature, not a bug. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** First, compile times are a major pain point. Even on powerful hardware, building large packages like web browsers, database servers, or full desktop environments from source can take hours. In a work setting where time is money, waiting on a system to compile can really hurt productivity—especially when you’re trying to quickly test or deploy something. Yes, you can use binary packages or distcc to speed things up, but it’s an extra layer of setup and management. Second, maintenance overhead is much higher than with binary-based distros. Keeping Gentoo systems updated in a production environment isn’t just a matter of running a single command; you have to actively monitor USE flags, handle occasional breakage, and resolve dependency conflicts yourself. That level of manual intervention can be frustrating, particularly when deadlines are tight or you’re juggling multiple projects. Finally, onboarding and collaboration can be challenging. Gentoo’s learning curve is steep, and if the rest of your team isn’t equally familiar with it, you end up being the de facto “Gentoo person” who has to troubleshoot and explain everything. This can slow down workflows and make your development environment harder to replicate. For solo projects or highly specialized systems it’s fine, but for large teams, the friction can outweigh the benefits. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** Gentoo solves the problem of lack of control and transparency that many binary-based distributions impose. In professional environments where performance, system behavior, and dependency management matter deeply like embedded systems, high-performance computing, or security-critical infrastructure Gentoo lets me control exactly what goes into the system and how it behaves. By compiling everything from source with custom USE flags and compiler optimizations, I can strip out unnecessary features, reduce attack surfaces, and optimize performance for specific hardware. This level of control translates into systems that are leaner, faster, and more predictable—essential in production environments where reliability and efficiency are non-negotiable. Additionally, Gentoo solves the problem of dependency and version conflicts that often plague complex projects. With Portage, I can finely tune package versions, patch sources directly, or maintain multiple versions of libraries in controlled slots. That flexibility makes it easier to align system dependencies with project requirements without being forced to conform to upstream package decisions. It’s especially useful in polyglot environments or when working with bleeding-edge technologies that haven't yet made it into more conservative distros. The benefit is a more deterministic and tailored development environment—something that's critical when debugging low-level behavior or trying to reproduce issues across machines. ### 2. Unmatched Customization and Performance for Power Users **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Bibek M. | IT Admin, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** December 10, 2025 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** The best thing about Gentoo is the unparalleled level of control it gives you over your system. Unlike most other Linux distributions, Gentoo allows you to build your entire system from the ground up, choosing exactly which packages to install and how they are configured. This is done through the Portage package management system, which compiles software from source code, letting you optimize it specifically for your hardware and performance needs. This level of customization is perfect for users who want to squeeze out the maximum performance or who have very specific software requirements. It’s a distro that rewards patience and attention to detail, but for those who enjoy tweaking and fine-tuning, it’s an incredibly powerful tool. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** The biggest downside of Gentoo is the time it takes to set things up and keep everything updated. Since most of the system is compiled from source, even simple updates can take a long time, especially on older hardware. The installation process is also much more involved than what you get with most mainstream distributions, so it’s not something you can just install quickly and start using right away. While the customization is great, it also means you have to spend more time troubleshooting and maintaining the system. If you’re not in the mood to tinker or you just need something that “just works,” Gentoo can feel a bit overwhelming and demanding. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** Gentoo solves the problem of limited flexibility and control over your operating system. While most Linux distros come preconfigured with packages and settings that may not be optimized for your specific hardware, Gentoo allows you to fine-tune everything. You can customize the kernel, choose exactly which features you want in a package, and set compile-time options that can boost performance. This results in a system that is optimized specifically for your needs, whether it’s for better performance, reduced bloat, or just learning how your system works at a deeper level. For me, Gentoo’s ability to squeeze every bit of performance out of my hardware is a big benefit. It gives me full control, which is perfect for projects where I need a lean, efficient, and personalized setup. ### 3. Transforms My Computer Into a Personalized Workhorse **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Information Technology and Services | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** February 17, 2026 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** What makes it truly unique is how it transforms my computer from a generic appliance into a personalized workhorse. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** It’s hard to move from Windows to Gentoo in a lot of ways. You get used to running setup programs or other common install commands, and that habit doesn’t always carry over. Gentoo is easy in its own way, but it’s definitely different. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** Most operating systems these days treat you like a tenant: they let you use the space, but don’t really allow you to customize its structure. ### 4. Ultimate Customization and Expert Community Support **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Jeffrey K. | VICE PRESIDENT OF HUMAN RESOURCES, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** December 17, 2025 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** GENTOO ALLOWS USERS TO TAILOR THEIR SYSTEM TO SPECIFIC NEEDS. GENTOO HAS KNOWLEDGEABLE COMMUNITY SUPPORT **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** IN GENTOO THE INSTALLATION AND CONFIGURATION PROCESSES CAN BE COMPLEX. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** IN GENTOO YOU CAN CHOOSE WHICH SOFTWARE TO INSTALL LEADING TO A SYSTEM THAT REFLECTS YOUR PREFERENCES. ### 5. A Powerful and Customizable Distro for Advanced Users **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Filippo T. | CTO & Co-Founder, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** June 05, 2025 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** While I appreciate Gentoo’s flexibility and performance, it’s not ideal for everyone. The setup and maintenance require a strong understanding of Linux, so I’d only recommend it to tech-savvy users. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** Gentoo’s biggest drawback is the steep learning curve and the time investment required for installation and maintenance. Compiling software from source can be time-consuming, especially on slower machines, and minor misconfigurations can lead to system instability. It’s definitely not suited for users looking for a quick or out-of-the-box Linux experience. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** Gentoo solves the problem of one-size-fits-all distributions by giving me full control over my system’s configuration and performance. By compiling software from source with only the features I need, I get a highly optimized and lightweight system tailored to my hardware and use case. This has helped me better understand Linux internals and build a more efficient, responsive environment for development and experimentation. ### 6. Good for custom performance **Rating:** 2.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Consulting | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** December 10, 2024 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** Good when you a looking for custom performance because you can build using flags, etc **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** Installation proccess a bit tedious. Quite steep learning curve. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** It is good for experimenting and compare ferformance with other OSs ### 7. Your Type of Tool if you love Customizability. **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Breanna L. | Software Engineer, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** June 14, 2024 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** I love learning new things everyday. Gentoo's hands on installation gives me an opportunity to explore and get invaluable knowledge on Linux systems. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** Customizability can consume quite amount of your time but for people like me it's where the fun is. It's not something I would say I dislike. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** Gentoo allows for flexibility enabling me to tailor a unique distribution in accordance with my unique needs at that time. ### 8. Gentoo is Linux From Scratch with some help **Rating:** 2.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Rei B. | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** June 09, 2023 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** What I love about Gentoo Linux is the absence of de-facto standards. You want OpenRC? Use it. You want Systemd? Sure. And no setup-tool messing up your configs. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** Honestly, the time you're sitting there compiling isn't for everybody, while new users may find it easy to break things. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** Gentoo allows me to add patches to various products by just placing them in /etc/portage/patches/... and it's considered the next time software gets built. ### 9. Most customizable Linux flavour available **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Georg R. | Senior Data Scientist, Utilities, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** February 10, 2023 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** Whatever I need, Gentoo has me covered. If there's any software not in the regular software tree, there's conceptual overlays by someone from the community containing the needed software. Use only what's needed, configure it to one's personal needs via USE flags, compile it in a breeze and get the best performance both from CPU/kernel and the software itself. And as with every linux, any personal settings are easily transferable to a new machine/device. The memory footprint is really small and the system is booted up from scratch in seconds -- way faster than my windows 11 laptop takes to wake from sleep. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** Compile times are sometimes a bit long, but that's due to the large software packages, not the system itself. Anything I don't like I can change and contribute to the community. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** Gentoo solves my needs for a flexible, configurable and fast operating system where I know I can do anything I want with it, given that I have enough knowledge how the system works. It benefits me in saving time for automating tasks and getting knowledge of how a technical OS works which benefits me in my job and elsewhere. ### 10. Very good experience with Gentoo **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Siddhartha Achari S. | System Engineer, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** May 03, 2023 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** The best about Gentoo is, it is the best Linux distrio have used ever. It gives me the best customization options like kernel patching and much more in runtime. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** No dislikes from Gentoo. As per my usage I has not seen any vulnerabilities. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** Gives me the best workspace for my work. ### 11. good linux experience **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Computer & Network Security | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** July 24, 2022 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** i like the simplicity of the user interface **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** i wish i can have some more customization **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** gentoo has really good portability and modulation with easy updates ### 12. Secure Customizable OS **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Geethu J. | Software test engineer, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** June 04, 2021 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** I was searching for a perfect OS that meets my needs finally I have come across Gentoo and now I am a happy user of Gentoo. I have been using Gentoo Os for the past 2 years, I have gone through many of its good features like : * It's Free. * Can customize, which many OS never provides. * Simple and pleasant user interface. * Lightweight OS. * Provide good security. * Good write and read speed. * We can have different versions of the same package in a machine. * Vey good build quality. * Good supporting team. * We need only a few PC resources. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** I have only a few dislikes about Gentoo os : * Need proper training to work in Gentoo. * Face difficulty in configuration. * Error found in the automatic update. **Recommendations to others considering Gentoo:** For sure I will recommend Gentoo to my friends because the standard and features that they provide are outstanding at the same time its useful to a great extend. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** The main problem that I solved using Gentoo is the speed of work, High security, and customization provided by them which helped me a lot. ### 13. Configuration and Customization as required **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Saravana K. | Consultant, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** November 29, 2021 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** Customization of the OS based on my requirement **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** Compile time takes some time in a low end pc **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** Works with any Intel Processors ### 14. Flexibility for development boxes **Rating:** 3.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Víctor O. | Tech Lead, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** April 29, 2021 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** Flexibility, software collection and the ability to tailor system according to my nees **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** Build times and bootstrapping process for new PCs **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** Mostly software development ### 15. Nice solid OS to learn Linux **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Printing | Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** May 25, 2021 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** Easy to use, packages are there for everything you need **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** Some of the GUIs are really ugly and they need more UI developers. **Recommendations to others considering Gentoo:** This is a good place to start. It was the first Linux distribution I was introduced to. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** Works really well with Linux and open source applications ### 16. Lightweight, customizable operating system **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Computer Hardware | Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** May 30, 2021 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** It's always been a lightweight operating system with highly customization freedom **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** However, the learning of Gentoo might be a bit hard at the beginning for the newcomers. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** I used Gentoo as a general-purpose operating system to surf the internet, perform document processing, etc. ### 17. Gentoo: An Artist's Linux **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Mandar J. | Writer, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** July 13, 2020 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** For me, Gentoo has always been a way to create art. Want a beautiful multimedia workstation, Gentoo! Want a GIMP workstation, Gentoo! A compilation workhorse, Gentoo! Any dedicated task you want a Linux box for, Gentoo! Tailor it for any task and it will do it well for you. Portage makes it easy to customize Gentoo to whatever you have in mind. Simply “emerge” the packages you need and Gentoo's package manager takes care of the dependencies for you. It allows you to USE what features you need and eliminate what you don’t need out of the system thereby giving you a very purpose built system. It will be big on disk space though because all the developer dependencies will be there. But you can then build a slim system out of it. This is particularly useful if you are building an embedded system. I myself have built systems for Rpi Zero to Rpi 2 to Rpi 3 to Tinkerboard and even Intel processor based systems which have been tailored this way. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** The only downside to using Gentoo is the amount of setup or compilation time requires you to put it. Even the best of developers are bound get tired but there is always a price to pay for greatness, isn't there? **Recommendations to others considering Gentoo:** Try it out on non essential systems first. It is a delight once you get a hang of it if you are a hardcore techie else it can be a pain. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** I am building customized systems using Gentoo. The benefits are very low runtime disk space once you have you task planned and defined. ### 18. Gentoo may be too hard for many new users/cloud users that are used to simple distributions **Rating:** 3.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Piotr K. | Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** January 07, 2021 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** It's great for learning deep Linux from the scratch **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** Nothing in fact. So rest of chars will be dots .... **Recommendations to others considering Gentoo:** Use it, when you have time to learn :) **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** None right now - last time I used Gentoo around 10 years ago :) ### 19. Gentoo: One of the best source based linux system **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Kosmas M. | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** June 23, 2020 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** All the information needed to build a linux from sources in one place, with a very good and active community. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** Not much that I can say I do not like about gentoo... **Recommendations to others considering Gentoo:** If you are looking for the most secure way to have a clean, stable and really open source software, if you need to customize the linux down to the last detail, then Gentoo is the way to go. Be prepaired to learn, and to do some research. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** Get out the best of linux for any specific hardware. Understand how things work in linux. Get the best possible performance. Be secure, be very secure. ### 20. fast linux distro **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Computer & Network Security | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** July 16, 2020 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** We have good community, they are ready to help your issues on Gentoo. Efficiency: I can configure which software features I wish to install. Not only software, but also Linux kernel. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** I take much time to update whole system. I usually do update one or twice per year. **Recommendations to others considering Gentoo:** If you like system programming, must choose Gentoo distro to install on your desktop. You will learn a lot of from it. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** Kernel configuration: it helps me to build own fast Linux on the specific hardware. ### 21. Finally one for me **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Retail | Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** December 23, 2020 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** Finally a distro tailored to my needs as a developer and a sysadmin **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** We should get more support on modern hardware **Recommendations to others considering Gentoo:** If you want a lean system go for it **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** Integrating different environments in one centralised management center ### 22. Compiling is fun **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Computer & Network Security | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** July 15, 2020 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** This is a distribution which allows a great degree freedom when designing a system. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** Your team will not have the time or ability to actively manage and maintain Gentoo as your prefered OS. Use CentOS instead. **Recommendations to others considering Gentoo:** Grow a huge neck beard to harness your inner IT powers prioir to re-emerging all packages in the world set, and run using --keep-going=y, or you'll never work out that Use flag dependency conflict. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** This distribution allows for great deal of freedom when designing an OS that is specific to the task. With portage, compiling every package on the system has never been easier. ### 23. Fast and flexible **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Computer & Network Security | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** December 25, 2020 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** Speed, flexibility, large and helpful community **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** Can be a bit overwhelming for a beginner **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** None at the moment ### 24. Gentoo, meh. **Rating:** 1.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** James P. | DevOps Engineer, Internet, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 29, 2019 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** Gentoo is good for security and speed, if you choose to compile all of your packages. Gentoo does a wonderful job of keeping security updates available. It can be a good install with minimal overhead. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** Gentoo is more complicated to setup and maintain than other linux operating systems. Install time is quite a bit longer when installing from scratch. Gentoo is not for new users. I have seen many individuals attempt to install it for desktop use and fail. The package manager for Gentoo is overly complicated. I love eix's search, but dealing with masked packages is a pain. It took us months to upgrade our custom packages to meet the requirements of new gentoo versions. This kept us from being able to offer the newest software when released, and often caused us to use legacy software versions while trying to keep up with those changes. **Recommendations to others considering Gentoo:** If you are not a highly advanced linux user who understands the inner-workings of the operating system, keep to distributions that are easier to deploy, such as Ubuntu or CentOS. If you are willing to put the work in, than gentoo can be a great operating system that will provide you security and stability above others. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** Used a customized version of Gentoo to provide a secure platform for Ruby On Rails applications. We benefited from being able to advertise a secure platform that was stable. ### 25. IT consultant **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Legal Services | Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** June 20, 2020 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** Package management system, emerge, portage, use flag, ebuild etc **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** Slow compiling time during installation and upgrading **Recommendations to others considering Gentoo:** Read the documentation before doing anything **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** Easy package and dependency management, fixing Individual package and dependency version ### 26. Gentoo linux system **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Pavol M. | Holiday time, Management Consulting, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 25, 2019 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** Gentoo is the "best os" from my personal perspective, because you can install exactly what you want. It means you can only install a selected package (only a www server, ftp server, load balancing server or email server) and nothing more and this is the most important fact about Gentoo. In opposite, compared to other distributions, Ubuntu, Fedora, .. there are many predefined packages that cannot be disabled and need to be installed and then manually removed. All these manual removation can create security risks to your system. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** Gentoo also has some flaws, it's a perfectly customized system, but you can easily face some errors when you try to compile / install some packages and it can be a really painful sort to the problem. However, as you can see all our servers still running on Gentoo. **Recommendations to others considering Gentoo:** Performance, clean install, secure, new updates available, install just what you need **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** Solving security problem, improved performance, installed mysql server, mysql cluster, cluster www solutions, energy efficient, stable it means runs over 3 years without need to restart or any other colissions, ### 27. Gentoo is the fastest penguin **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Education Management | Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** June 21, 2020 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** You can always compile from source, and optimize for cpu. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** The time you need to wait compiling even when it is automated. **Recommendations to others considering Gentoo:** If you need to get dirt and work with the bits use gentoo, your learning is guaranted. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** Domain Controllers and email services for workgroups. ### 28. professionally enriching, with Gentoo I understood how Linux works. **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Carlos L. | Senior Database Administrator, Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 29, 2019 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** portage tree - the use of it, flexibility and structure. The handbook online effort work and mantained for many years by the team which makes possible people understand how and why Gentoo works as it does. The flexibility of the Stage tarball archive, in which lets you decide how deep and far depending your needs you can configure your system. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** sometimes it takes some time to release the new versions in the portage in comparison with other distros which makes it sometimes a little hard, however it is understandable that in order to have a complete ecosystem paired the release of new versions would be stable. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** I've used as document certification system for an experimental thesis. ### 29. Good to learn the insights of GNU Linux if you are eager to learn and have the time **Rating:** 3.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Information Technology and Services | Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 28, 2019 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** I liked Gentoo because it offered me a completely different look to how Linux worked and all I could learn in the process. For me it was good because most Linux distributions at the time were really oriented to make them as easy as possible to install for 1st time users. But Gentoo had a different approach almost like a Linux from scratch depending on which stage you select to start with. I selected stage 3 at first but then I was eager to learn how stage 1 and 2 worked and I learned a lot thanks to that. I had a lot of deeper knowledge on Linux because I was not relying on graphical tools but on the command line, that set up my profile to become a Unix and Linux Sysadmin for the next 15+ years. Emerge was also great, the fact that you can customize the compilation flags was amazing to the best possible performance depending on what processor you were running it in and that was awesome. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** I am not sure if I disliked anything about it. The learning curve was really fine and it is until today an amazing distro. I had it on a time where I did not have a broadband connection so using emerge to update was really a downside because of how slow it was, besides that there was not many stage 3 repositories to get the packages from at the time. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** Gentoo as I said helped me to improve my technical knowledge about how Linux works because you have to understand a lot of things before being able to install it and also after the 1st initial setup, other distros at the time oriented to ease of use were designed to not force you to investigate that much, as in runlevels, processes, logs, and also compiling your own kernel with what you really needed. It helped me to learn to investigate, reason, try to solve problems on my own as well as finding out that the community support is really great, adding my grain of sand anytime I could. I can say that thanks to Gentoo I became the Sysadmin I am today ### 30. Linux with all the tools for web server and personal computer. **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Miguel R. | Software Engineer, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** August 07, 2019 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** Good program performance and less RAM consumption, the best for low-resource computers. Adapt to any need, web server, personal computer, on my phone. Open Source and free. Kernel tested and tested before launch. Create 100% free system thanks to Portage. Compile any type of file with the default installation. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** It is difficult to configure and does not bring default programs, after installation you have to download and install the programs you need. **Recommendations to others considering Gentoo:** I recommend a user with Linux experience, with Gentoo you have many possibilities to have a computer with everything you need from home and work, it adapts to what you want. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** Compile any file and I have a low-resource computer installed, Gentoo uses very low resources because it does not install extra programs, only the operating system, then you install what you need and convert it into a perfect web server or computer for personal use. ### 31. Safe and basic. Gentoo Linux **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Marcos C. | Software Engineer, Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** July 29, 2019 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** Gentoo is totally free maintained by the community without any company behind where you can have a completely free and secure Open Source system. Just install the programs necessary for its function, where you can choose what to do next. With Gentoo I have a very secure and robust server, where I can modify and install what I want, receive updates first than other Linux distributions which gives me more security on my server. Gentoo demands very few PC resources, you can install on any PC with the basics and there decide what to install to work. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** Upon receiving an automatic update, sometimes I get an error with my system, which makes some processes stop stopping my server from working and the compiled programs are very difficult to install. **Recommendations to others considering Gentoo:** I recommend to users with experience with Linux, this system is very robust but it is complicated to configure, if you want to test your skills with Free Software I recommend you to Gentoo. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** I can have a secure system, low resources and completely free, where I can program what I need. I have a local server on a low resource PC. ### 32. The best distro for developers! **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Dmitry V. | Software Expert, Computer Software, Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 28, 2019 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** The best thing about Gentoo is portage! It allows you to have several versions of the same package. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** The sad thing is that you have to be pretty experienced to work with this distro. Especially when emerge conflicts involved :) **Recommendations to others considering Gentoo:** If you want to become an expert in Linux and get the best performance from it - Gentoo is for you! **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** Performance and Linux learning are the most important factors to use Gentoo. If you need a distro tailored to your hardware Gentoo is the best choice! ### 33. Used for years on my work laptop **Rating:** 3.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Mirko S. | Network Security Engineer, Information Technology and Services, Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 29, 2019 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** I've liked the possibility to choose what deps to install and build a system that suits at his best the hardware **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** In some cases it takes too long to have a working machine. The training curve is really vertical **Recommendations to others considering Gentoo:** Try for 1 month. It's an incredible experience. Use as much workers as you can! **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** With gentoo as OS on my laptop it was possible for me to deeply understand how the linux system works. Thanks to gentoo I've learned to build my own kernel ### 34. Linux distribution for web server and personal PC. **Rating:** 3.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Rafael R. | Software Engineer, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** August 13, 2019 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** I like that it uses very low PC resources. It doesn't install anything extra, only what's necessary to boot the operating system. I adapt it to my web server applications to share web pages, files, and proxy server. Comfortable desktop. The Kernel is tried and tested before its release. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** Setting up and compiling some programs is difficult. **Recommendations to others considering Gentoo:** I recommend to a user with experience in Linux, with Gentoo you have many possibilities to have a computer with everything necessary for home and work, it adapts to what you want. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** I use Gentoo to set up a web server and for personal use, browsing the Internet, and work at home. ### 35. Great linux distro for a hands-on SysAdmin **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Steven D. | Owner and President, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** January 10, 2019 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** If you like to get your hands dirty and really understand how the components of your distro work together, build or modify anything from scratch, use modern versions of important software tools without a need for 3rd party repositories, and still have access to a vibrant community for support: I'd consider Gentoo a fit. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** Yes, compiling from scratch is a time-sink for some applications (Libreoffice, Chrome, etc). I tend to have to schedule these large compiles in advance, and honestly on our slower machines it wouldn't be reasonable. But... any slower machines we have generally don't need the larger packages like our workstations. And our workstations are all rather fast. Plus cross-compiling using a distcc farm really helps. **Recommendations to others considering Gentoo:** If you are an experienced Linux admin, you will be able to become comfortable with Gentoo pretty quickly. There have been enough recent advances so that modern SysAdmin conveniences exist for most tasks, and the portage tree is excellent (and very extensible if you ever want to create your own overlay, we have one for some of our custom tools!). Give it a try -- with modern processing power it isn't nearly as time consuming as the reputation you might have heard! **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** I run all our in office infrastructure on Gentoo. Our remote servers are CentOS and quite frankly I prefer Gentoo much more than the CentOS installs. Despite the occasional challenge when a build fails, it is generally not a problem. And it is definitely much easier to keep a nice slim system without having to pull in stupid dependencies because someone upstream decided it was important. I have automated all of our security and general maintenance tasks on these machines without a problem. I can keep things patched, and whenever I need it -- I can upgrade to a newer version of system without a poorly supported 3rd party repo. PHP upgrades on CentOS? Couldn't be worse. Gentoo? Just compile! Newer version of apache httpd? Sure! Modern MySQL releases? YUP! ### 36. gentoo experience in a corporate world **Rating:** 2.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Computer & Network Security | Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 29, 2019 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** gentoo will teach you the fundamentals of Linux operating systems, you will appreciate the firmness of its build for a minimum resource, yet wider usage of the functionality of Linux OS. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** legacy console, thus powerful working on the said environment due to less resource required to run gentoo on a specific H/W or VM. **Recommendations to others considering Gentoo:** not yet aware of the updates, but to improve further on GUI's. **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** working on the GUI part.. integrating applicable GUI interfaces available on web. ### 37. I'm using it home for tiny server. **Rating:** 3.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Transportation/Trucking/Railroad | Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 28, 2019 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** Rolling updates... That's almost always works, it allows you to keep track of changes in linux world by dealing with problems of packages and compatibility. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** Absence of repositories with precompiled packages. Sometimes I just want to roll update fast. **Recommendations to others considering Gentoo:** be prepared for a really deep dive into linux internals **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** Router, NAS,etc. with most recent patches for kernel for iptables and some iscsi drivers. Love openrc and other configuration utils. ### 38. Genttoo for embedded systems **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Muhammad E. | VP commerical, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 26, 2019 **What do you like best about Gentoo?** Gentoo used to have the most powerful tools to develop a Linux based embedded OS. **What do you dislike about Gentoo?** Building system and package sources wasn't well maintained **What problems is Gentoo solving and how is that benefiting you?** Developed tiny OS ## Gentoo Discussions - [Does Gentoo come with a GUI?](https://www.g2.com/discussions/does-gentoo-come-with-a-gui) - 1 comment - [View Gentoo pricing details and edition comparison](https://www.g2.com/products/gentoo/reviews?section=pricing&secure%5Bexpires_at%5D=2026-06-25+20%3A25%3A48+-0500&secure%5Bsession_id%5D=592549fe-14df-487c-ae50-5d59489175d0&secure%5Btoken%5D=111faaa2a54da9892e7fc609e4ff63a0b2ed2da07acd064886b3b9460c9e4241&format=llm_user) ## Gentoo Features **Memory Management - Operating System** - RAM management **Device Management - Operating System** - I/O management **Backup and Recovery - Operating System** - Data backup **Error Detection - Operating System** - System operations monitoring ## Top Gentoo Alternatives - [Debian](https://www.g2.com/products/debian/reviews) - 4.6/5.0 (219 reviews) - [Slackware](https://www.g2.com/products/slackware/reviews) - 4.4/5.0 (30 reviews) - [Fedora](https://www.g2.com/products/fedora/reviews) - 4.4/5.0 (206 reviews)