Synaptic is a graphical package management program for apt. It provides the same features as the apt-get command line utility with a GUI front-end based on Gtk+.




Octopi is described as 'The highest rated graphical user interface for the Arch Linux pacman package management tool in AUR. It is written in C++ using the Qt toolkit and its source code is hosted on GitHub. The first commits date from February 2013' and is a Package Manager in the os & utilities category. There are seven alternatives to Octopi for Linux, Arch Linux, Manjaro Linux, Debian and Xfce. The best Octopi alternative is Synaptic, which is both free and Open Source. Other great apps like Octopi are pacman (package manager), Pamac, bauh and Muon.
Synaptic is a graphical package management program for apt. It provides the same features as the apt-get command line utility with a GUI front-end based on Gtk+.




The pacman package manager is one of the major distinguishing features of Arch Linux . It combines a simple binary package format with an easy-to-use build system. The goal of pacman is to make it possible to easily manage packages, whether...




It can list pacman and AUR packages at the same time.
Pamac and Octopi are both GUI ways of interacting with pacman, the package manager in Arch and Manjaro Linux distros. Both are excellent, but Pamac is probably the more user-friendly by a small margin. Octopi comes with Manjaro's KDE Plasma version; Pamac with the XFCE, Mate and other GTK-derived desktop environments.
PAMAC is better laid out and has some very practical features missing from Octopi, such as showing history of installed/removed packages and the ability to tell it to ignore updates for some packages. I suggest viewing some YouTube clips to get an idea of which interface is more user-friendly also, i prefer PAMACs.


Almost everyone thinks Pamac is a great Octopi alternative.
bauh (ba-oo), formerly known as fpakman, is a graphical interface for managing your Linux software (packages/applications). It currently supports the following formats: AppImage, ArchLinux repositories/AUR, Flatpak, Snap and Web applications.

Manage applications and libraries installed on your system to the package level. Search, install and remove packages and inspect their versions and their dependencies.

kalu (which could stand for "Keeping Arch Linux Up-to-date") is a small application that will add an icon to your systray and sit there, regularly checking if there's anything new for you to upgrade.




tkPacman is a lightweight graphical user interface for 'pacman', the package manager of Arch Linux.


While pacman is the package manager, Octopi is a GUI using pacman. Not really the same thing.