Looking for a very leightweight but snappy Linux Distro for JUST running Web browsers.

[BaidDSB]

Hopefully ubuntu based, at least debian based.

 

I plan to use it in Virtualbox. but i will give it 8 GB ram and enough cpu cores.

 

I tried Mint even even that feels "heavy".

[thevictor390]

Seems like the perfect use for ChromeOS Flex.

[DrMacintosh]

Try Lubuntu. I run Lubuntu in a VirtualBox VM on my 2018 Mac mini home server. All it does it torrent Linux ISOs all day. It only needs like 1GB of memory to run (I give it 4GB) and I only give it 2 cores but I believe it could run on 1. 

[OldTweaker]

I myself switched to Mabox for that purpose. Nice is that it has virtualbox guest additions preinstalled. It is however not a Debian like distro. It is based on Manjaro. Windowmanager is openbox, very lightweight.

 

if you really want a Debian type, how about Debian, install X, openbox for windowmanager?  

[GeoStellar]

any ubuntu derivative should be good, except the people who decidedc to carry on with the unity interface, that wont.  I expiramented a while ago with ubuntu mate turning a bunch of old laptops into thin clients and it went really well. should be perfect for your use.

[Radium_Angel]

Crunchbang++

[Herr.Hoefkens]

while chrome os flex , is based on it, if you require more granular control / customatisation, and even less overhead. if you have the time to configure it

there will be no better choice then gentoo,( if you do require some maintenance infrastructure) its why google chose it as the base for chrome os to. buy doing it yourself means that you get to compile everything just for that system (you can use a beefy one to do the compiling on using ICECC/ICECREAM or DISTCC)  making it that much more snappy and stable...and that much more lightweight because if its an intel you can drop all amd optimisation code right then and there , if you dont need it to run a DE , you can drop all kde and gnome integration code in the browser right then and there,....

[HeroRareheart]

I'm kinda late to the party but if this is still being developed it would fit perfectly https://ubuntu-web.org/

[BankHealthy]

Get AntiX or MXLinux.

[The Hope]

mageia + XFCE or WM

ROSA Fresh + LXQt or WM

GhostBSD + MATE or WM

siduction + XFCE or LXQt or WM

ALT Sisyphus + LXQt or WM

EndeavourOS + i3wm
Devuan + XFCE or WM

Void Linux

Clear Linux + i3wm

Artix Linux + LXQt or WM

DragonFly BSD

Alpine Linux + XFCE or bspwm

FreeBSD + XFCE or LXQt or bspwm/i3/spectrwm/dwm/etc.

 

The names in bold satisfy your requirement that you can use apt-get (the typical Ubuntu/Debian command).

 

The names in italics are going to perform best in a VM in terms of (system) boot times, app startup times, and performance in WebXPRT and other browser benchmarks.

[E-waste]

WM is window maker, and is based on software and ideas developed almost 30 years ago.  It is very light, and has great theming options.