I used Ubuntu in my college for some light programming and felt really happy about it.
I am more interested in switching to Debian 12 than Ubuntu, since the former is really stable. Also, I came to know installing Debian is easier since it supports non free firmware.
Stable just means no major version jumps in software that might break your current setup. That’s important for operating servers, not desktops.
I use debian Sid (unstable) at work and never had problems. Most of the time I get updates prior to other distributions I am using.
At home I use arch (derivates, manjaro), with great success.
I would abstain from Ubuntu. There, I had problems, it is very opinionated and not in s good way.
In a general sense I would always chose a distribution that isn’t too locked in to a certain desktop environment and provides updates, quickly.
I am currently using Fedora and have been eyeing Debian for a while. Just curious which one do you think would be closer to fedora between sid and testing? And when a new major version of gnome drops, about how many months would it take before its available for sid & testing?
+1 for Arch for desktop setups. If setup well, I have not really encountered my desktop system breaking, and if broken, usually can fix since it teaches you how to set up when you install the first time. Also, great documentation and forums.
+1 for Manjaro