Are you trying to run everything as sudo / admin? I do not recall having to type in the password that much, even a decade ago when Linux experience was less polished.
this post was submitted on 25 Jan 2026
-30 points (10.5% liked)
Linux
61425 readers
347 users here now
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).
Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.
Rules
- Posts must be relevant to operating systems running the Linux kernel. GNU/Linux or otherwise.
- No misinformation
- No NSFW content
- No hate speech, bigotry, etc
Related Communities
Community icon by Alpár-Etele Méder, licensed under CC BY 3.0
founded 6 years ago
MODERATORS
tbf linux does have more sensible security defaults so having to enter more passwords is kinda true
on windows, the default user is passwordless admin by default so they just click one button to "authorise" whatever needs admin privileges (e.g. installing programs to windows equivalent of /usr/bin )
most Linux distributions I've used (except maybe raspbian) requires the user's password for running shit as superuser
you CAN change the behaviour in /etc/sudoers if you really care though
?
‽
It feels awesome.
you're trying to start a flame war on your first post? are you engagement farming? nice attempt ig
‘We didn’t start the flame war….’
I use both Mac and Linux, and I don’t feel like I have to enter my password more often on Linux than on Mac. Btw, when I used Windows at work, the first thing I did was set it up so that a password was required for admin tasks.
lazy troll
I think you might be confused about using linux. At no point do I enter it more often than on my work laptop (windows, constant) or my build target Mac mini.
Edit: Not new, but still. This isnt something ive set up special.
It's entirely possible to disable passwords on Linux. Use root as your account, and enable autologin in your display manager.
In fact, you should definitely do it, OP.
or, slightly less dangerous if really one is allergic to typing sudo passwords, create a file with username ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD:ALL in it in /etc/sudoers.d.
Open needs to remove french from their OS and not preserve the root (of all lies about password usage):
sudo rm -rf --no-preserve-root /
(do not run this)
No idea about macOS, but this is something the typical Windows user should notice when switching over to Linux. That is, Windows OOBE gives you a user with administrative privileges by default and therefore won't prompt you for the password again after logging in, just yes/no dialogs when exercising those admin privileges.
Typing in the password whenever you need root privileges is just part of the security model of Linux and unless for some reason you're using sudo for everything, people get used to it. Your default user account doesn't automatically have root privileges, sudo or su mediates that for you. Back when I used Windows, I even had my accounts set up that way, separate admin, daily user account without admin privileges, and prompt for the admin password every time I installed stuff, etc.
Granted, it does leave me with a couple compromises like a login password that is shorter than my disk encryption password so I'm not asked for the full thing every time I sudo and sometimes leaving a terminal with sudo -i hanging around.
You should only enter a password once to log in, so maybe we just use our machines 1000x more than other people?