What is the difference between Mate and Cinnamon in Mint 21.1?

[emmetk1]

What is the difference between mate and cinnamon in mint 21.1

[Pjotr]

Look and feel. And some different default apps. Finally, MATE uses less resources than Cinnamon.

Do a testdrive with the live sessions of both editions, if you need to know more.

[Petermint]

MATE uses less resources than Cinnamon

Cinnamon can run with "effects" off or on. With effects off, it is similar to MATE. If your hardware needs light, use Xfce or LXDE.

Cinnamon can use a GPU for speed and MATE cannot. If you have a GPU, your comparison results will be different. This is a good reason to download both and live boot both to test the differences.

Test the file managers in both as the file manager in Cinnamon has some brilliant features. Also allow for the Mint team copying features from Cinnamon to MATE after a few months for any code they develop or control.

If your machine is young enough to have USB 3 and SSD, you are unlikely to see a speed difference. What is your hardware?

[billyswong]

Different feature set. Hard to list them all but you can experiment by yourself. In general Cinnamon contains more "new" features while MATE contains more "old" features.

[rickNS]

1, I like the MATE Menu.
A, you can find a programs real name, (and modify it's launcher if you want) in two clicks, this takes 6 (or 7) on Cinnamon.
B, I like how MATE's menu "remembers" it's last location, say you use all category and scroll down to "take screenshot", and then you want to take another, you open the Menu, and it's right there. Cinnamon always returns to the start point.

2, Some people complain about things being too small on high res. screens, I like how you can scale things up in MATE, by changing the DPI, and you can do that accurately, by increments of 1.

3, Some people like to add a folder to the panel, this could not be easier on MATE, just drag it down there.

4, MATE can use different window managers, and I like Compiz, that alone makes it no contest for me.