Software Alternatives & Reviews

Portage VS NixOS

Compare Portage VS NixOS and see what are their differences

Portage logo Portage

Portage is source-based package manager used by Gentoo and its descendants. It controls all process from fetching source through building it, installing into clean environment to "merging" with already installed software.

NixOS logo NixOS

25 Jun 2014 . All software components in NixOS are installed using the Nix package manager. Packages in Nix are defined using the nix language to create nix expressions.
  • Portage Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-09-26
  • NixOS Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-09-12

Portage videos

Nursing video 2 portage learning, prerequisite courses

More videos:

  • Review - THOROGOOD 1892 PORTAGE Series #814-6522 [ THE BOOT GUY REVIEWS ]
  • Review - Thorogood Portage Boots Review in Indigo Chromexcel

NixOS videos

First Impression of the NixOS Installation Procedure

More videos:

  • Review - Introduction to NixOS - Brownbag by Geoffrey Huntley
  • Review - NixOS 18.03 - A Configuration-focused GNU+Linux Distro

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to Portage and NixOS)
Package Manager
15 15%
85% 85
Front End Package Manager
Developer Tools
21 21%
79% 79
Containers As A Service
100 100%
0% 0

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare Portage and NixOS

Portage Reviews

We have no reviews of Portage yet.
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NixOS Reviews

The 10 Best Immutable Linux Distributions in 2024
Why it’s on the list: NixOS uses the Nix package manager, which treats packages as isolated from each other. This unique approach to package management virtually eliminates “dependency hell”.

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, NixOS seems to be more popular. It has been mentiond 246 times since March 2021. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

Portage mentions (0)

We have not tracked any mentions of Portage yet. Tracking of Portage recommendations started around Mar 2021.

NixOS mentions (246)

  • I use NixOS for my home-server, and you should too!
    As we covered in my last post, NixOS is a amazing Linux distribution for creating stable and declared environments. Now while this is amazing for a desktop setup, it is also perfect for a home-server or home-lab. - Source: dev.to / 6 days ago
  • Colima k8s nix setup
    Nix is a cross-platform package manager. It uses the nix programming language. Nix and NixOs are often used in the same context, but while the first is a package manager, the latter is a linux distribution based on nix. - Source: dev.to / 11 days ago
  • NixOs - Your portable dev enviroment
    Today I want to talk to you about Nixos. What is it? Nixos is a declarative and reproducible OS, partly taking the words used on their own page. What does that mean? - Source: dev.to / 20 days ago
  • Nix – A One Pager
    Software developers often want to customize: 1. Their home environments: for packages (some reach for brew on MacOS) and configurations (dotfiles, and some reach for stow). 2. Their development shells: for build dependencies (compilers, SDKs, libraries), tools (LSP, linters, formatters, debuggers), and services (runtime, database). Some reach for devcontainers here. 3. Or even their operating systems: for... - Source: Hacker News / 21 days ago
  • Tools for Linux Distro Hoppers
    Hopping from one distro to another with a different package manager might require some time to adapt. Using a package manager that can be installed on most distro is one way to help you get to work faster. Flatpak is one of them; other alternative are Snap, Nix or Homebrew. Flatpak is a good starter, and if you have a bunch of free time, I suggest trying Nix. - Source: dev.to / about 1 month ago
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What are some alternatives?

When comparing Portage and NixOS, you can also consider the following products

Conda - Binary package manager with support for environments.

GNU Guix - Like Nix but GNU.

pkgsrc - pkgsrc is a framework for building over 17,000 open source software packages.

Homebrew - The missing package manager for macOS

Pacman - Pacman was developed to be the package manager for Arch Linux, and is also used by KDE-focused Chakra Linux.

Chocolatey - The sane way to manage software on Windows.