I’ve seen people suggest Ubuntu without mentioning Kubuntu, but it seems like most people (especially gamers?) prefer KDE Plasma. I’ve seen people complain about Ubuntu’s GUI and lack of customization, but then no one suggests them to try Kubuntu instead. It seems like people just don’t know that Kubuntu exists.
Also as an aside, people often criticize how slow updates are on Ubuntu/Kubuntu/etc, but if you enable the backports ppa then it’s actually pretty quick!
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:kubuntu-ppa/backports
I feel like a lot of any residual bad talk on KDE stems from when Plasma 5 was new. It was rough for years. I’m guess by the Steam Deck it became pretty close to as visually consistent as all the default gnome applications. It’s a lot more stable now too compared to a decade ago. Not just the desktop environment, stuff like really wide appealing applications like Kdenlive are way better than they used to be. I think it makes sense that it’s only recent that Fedora promoted KDE Plasma to default/flagship along side gnome as equals. A decade ago, KDE Plasma 5 wasn’t there. Today KDE Plasma is. So maybe because of that and the Steam Deck, KDE is going to be more default than gnome in the future. I’m on KDE and I feel like a decade ago hot corners felt way more pleasant to me on gnome than KDE. It’s how I switch windows along with alt tab. Maybe more often use hot corner to see an overview of windows. Animations are great now