Like I mentioned when talking about Desktop Environments, Linux is still a terminal-first operating system. While the graphical side has evolved tenfold over the years, the console remains at the very heart of interaction.
You can absolutely do your daily work in graphical applications—be it your browser, office suite, or music player—but some things are still more efficient (or only possible) in the console.
Personally, I just take it as the de facto way Linux works. On Windows, I expect programs to be wrapped in .exe installers with full GUIs. On Linux, I expect the “juicy stuff” to be in the form of a command. And at the very least, if the graphical environment fails, I know I can always fall back to the terminal and continue my work—or repair the GUI.
Coming from Windows, this might feel overly technical or intimidating at first. But it’s actually a relief once you experience it. Look at it this way: when your Windows desktop freezes, what can you do? Not much. You usually hit reset and hope it boots up again. On Linux, you have more options. Did your GNOME or KDE session lock up? No problem: press CTRL + ALT + F3 and you’re dropped into a working terminal. Log in, kill the frozen process, restart the desktop session—no full reboot required.
That’s why I see the command line as something I expect on Linux, just as I expect Windows to be… filled with windows (and sometimes, blue screens). What might seem like a relic of the past is, in practice, a powerful safety net and an indispensable tool.
And here’s a fun fact: did my Linux machine ever hang so badly that even the console was frozen? Yes, it did. The Num Lock light got stuck, the whole system unresponsive. Even then, I had one last trick: Alt + PrtSc + B. That magic key combo immediately reboots the system without a hard power-off. Linux has a whole toolbox of “secrets” like this—and discovering them makes you realize just how much thought has gone into keeping the system recoverable.