So… Mostly good results actually. I tested the default profiles from the manufacturer and they seem ok. They are not as good as my custom ones on Windows for a couple of different reasons, but they are good enough to make me no longer see it as a major issue. Thanks again for the suggestion!

I also doublechecked the ArchWiki and according to that, ICC profiles are supposed to be cross-platform compatible and that profiling on Windows or MacOS and transferring the files over is a solution. But I’ve also read the opposite somewhere and my own profiles from Windows do not look great on Linux for whatever reason. So it seems that my own profiles from Windows are somehow not compatible, but ICC profiles fundamentally can be and that the manufacturer’s profiles are in this case.

Personally I wouldn’t mind having to profile/calibrate on Windows every now and then because I expect to keep it around on a separate drive for a long time yet for those use cases Linux don’t meet my requirements, but sadly I did not get good results that way. Maybe I’ll try different profiling software later and see if it’s a problem with the Calibrite software.

For anyone having the same issues as me and finds this thread later: I would recommend dual-booting and profiling on Windows and testing those first. If they work well for you, great, else you can compromise a little and use the manufacturer’s profiles if they are available and decently made. Hopefully it’s not too long until we get a good native solution, but for now there doesn’t seem to be any.

I would love some more details as well about why they found it so difficult. I tried it myself just now without really knowing how to, and it was pretty easy. You either find the option by searching, or go to Settings -> Accounts -> Other Users -> Add account.

They do try getting you to add a Microsoft account first and you have to choose “I don’t have this person’s sign-in information” and “Add a user without a Microsoft account” which is the only other option than Cancel at that point to continue, then you set the username and password and you’re done. To be clear, it would be better if they immediately gave you a clear option between local user and Microsoft account, but I would hardly call it selling your soul and whatnot.

But Microsoft for sure deserve most of the complaints they’re getting and it’s only getting worse.

I didn’t think of the “premade” profiles actually, thanks for the suggestion. Using the manufacturers own profiles typically aren’t ideal as each display can be a little different even if they are the exact same model and they change a bit over time, but maybe that’s the best I can get for now.

I expect them to have been created on Windows like I did with my own and as such will have the same problem because Linux and Windows color management are fundamentally quite different, but it is certainly worth a try. I will test that a bit later. It could never match custom profiles, but it could possibly be good enough.

I think both Bazzite and CachyOS are solid recommendations, but only Bazzite is immutable out of those two.