POLL: What Operating Systems do you use for music production? (Jan 2026)

[audiojunkie]

_In_ the Readers Choice?

If it doesn’t have the question already (I don’t complete the survey, so no idea) just add an extra question about OS.

That's a genius idea!!!! The question could incorporate the multiple choice options and give the percentages just like this poll, but there wouldn't need to be a whole separate poll. Instead of listing the "winner", the results of each os and the percentages could be listed for each option. Now if only we can get Ben to go along with it!!! I'd give up doing this poll completely.

[audiojunkie]

I will try to get a group email going. If anyone wants to be involved, please let me know, so I can add you to the group email.

[El°HYM]

Kind of hard to put it into the right place, as effects, instruments & hosts would all apply. The numbers of this new poll are quite different to the deleted one, so not too much exposure as mentioned. The idea to kind of KVR it seems the most logical, depending on how easy to do etc. - as those numbers could also be useful, since it at least would show how the different OS are distributed among the KVR - user base.

Please repost the poll but keep it to one topic.

[audiojunkie]

Yeah, I'm just thinking about next year.

[DrGonzo]

MacOs all the way. But I am seriously thinking of start dipping my toes into the waters of Linux.

[audiojunkie]

It’s fun!

[audiojunkie]

What’s interesting, is that there has been a 6% increase of Linux users, compared to last year’s poll: from 10% to 16%.

viewtopic.php?t=617324

Also, before this year’s poll was trashed and we had to start again, there had been 46 responses for Linux, which was more than the responses from last year.

So there for sure was growth since last year.

[lunardigs]

Linux has been a joy to run lately. Including music and production.

[El°HYM]

Me can confirm! Had a little Linux setup years ago and just recently set up a new Ubuntu/Studio machine. Actually only installed the Audio related stuff on top. I am still quite surprised how snappy and stable it is running, also pretty easy installation. Seeing new and well known Developers adding native versions almost Daily now, is giving me a happy smile.

[sunthief01]

Migrated to Linux 3 weeks ago (Fedora Kinoite, an atomic distro). Bitwig, PlugData and windows VSTs all working well. Currently mastering an album in Kinoite I produced on windows last year and will be doing all production this year on Linux.

Kinoite has been incredible so far - though perhaps a bit streasful, the learning curve has actually been awesome and the performance / user experience is really strong. Vastly prefer it to Windows already and much more aligned with my values as well.

[Seafire Mk2]

There are 649116 users at KvR, last year 416 of them voted in the poll.

[audiojunkie]

There is still some time left!! If you haven't voted, please vote. If you voted before, check to confirm that your vote still shows--there was a mishap after many people had voted, and we lost everything and had to start over. Please check and confirm that your vote shows, or please do vote again, so that we can get as many votes as possible.

[audiojunkie]

There are 649116 users at KvR, last year 416 of them voted in the poll.

Maybe, but how many of those 649116 are still active after 23 years of KVRAudio being active? Also, there are many scientific studies that have a very small group of people. This is still representative sampling and can give an indication of where the likely trends are going.

[Scrubbing Monkeys]

Using Win 10 for now. I would have switched to linux if my Motu Ultralite mk3 would play nice. It is not class compliant.

[audiojunkie]

Using Win 10 for now. I would have switched to linux if my Motu Ultralite mk3 would play nice. It is not class compliant.

Bummer. At least you will know to look for class compliance in your next audio interface purchase.

Here's another tip about audio interfaces. Since Linux usually can't access built-in DSP and software features (since companies still aren't providing Linux software for their hardware), it is best to look for an audio device that has all of the options as physical controls on the device. If the physical controls are on the device and you don't need to use software to access them, then the device should work fine with Linux as long as it is class compliant.