Mainly Kali for my needs, completely hassle-free on VMware but any ARM version should work.

Want me to try a particular distro as a test?

I dunno if that counts, but I was given a Macbook Air M2 from work that I didn’t need and I’ve been happily running macOs on it for simple daily use.

Whenever the situation requires Linux I fire up one of 3 distros I have as a VM and they work like a charm. I pass-through one of the USB ports to the VM and it’s basically an M1 with Linux at that point in terms of performance (well not really, but it’s very smooth, no complaints).

Might wanna go that route instead, just run macOs natively and your favorite distro as a VM.

One way to do it is for each company to develop their own flavor to ship with their laptop, in much the same way phone manufacturers just modify Android and ship it.

As an example, check out System76 and their laptops featuring their Pop!_OS distro, which is very user friendly and stable in my experience.

Am sysadmin, can confirm I don’t wanna learn it.

Non tech savvy people don’t install windows or macos either. Everything comes pre-installed with the machine you buy.

If you make it to the point where you kinda know what Rufus and an iso file are, Pop! OS and Mint are easier to install than Windows.

I suppose a program could be made that partitions your OS drive and installs a distro on the second partition with a dual boot selection screen on next boot, but if you’re at the point where you’re curious enough about Linux to try it, you’ve probably learned enough to use Rufus and an iso file.

The answer is system integrators need to pre install and actively support one of the more friendly distros (like Valve with SteamOS on the deck) or it’ll never catch on.

Simple users don’t care what OS you present them with, as long as it’s already there and it’s easy to use.