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Install on Ubuntu or Debian

Francois Carpentier edited this page Aug 6, 2022 · 6 revisions

To install AppImageLauncher on Debian, Ubuntu and derivative distributions, there's two main ways. This section introduces you into both.

On Ubuntu and derivatives, you can use one of the PPAs provided by Peter Jonas. This way, you receive updates automatically.

On other Debian-based systems or if you do not want to use the PPAs, you can install AppImageLauncher manually using one of the .deb packages provided on this latest release page. To choose the appropriate .deb package for your Debian-based system, use this table, under its Compatible distributions column.

Use the PPAs

Note: The PPAs are only available for Ubuntu and other distros based on 19.04 and newer. If you use an older version, please skip to the next section.

There are two PPAs available for Ubuntu users, stable and daily. stable provides the latest releases and is updated shortly after a release is made on GitHub. daily provides the latest and greatest but potentially unstable builds directly made from the development branch.

For the average user, we recommend using stable.

To add the PPA to your system, you can execute the following commands:

sudo apt install software-properties-common
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:appimagelauncher-team/stable
sudo apt update
sudo apt install appimagelauncher

For more information, please refer to the PPAs' websites:

Installing directly from GitHub

Note: The main drawback from using GitHub is that you won't receive updates automatically. Please make sure to check the release page from time to time to download the latest and greatest versions.

First, download the package suitable for your system. There's support for all still-supported Ubuntu releases, Debian oldstable and newer as well as all derivatives (e.g., Linux Mint) for 32-bit and 64-bit Intel/AMD CPU based systems (state: Feb 2020). For newer releases, we also support ARM devices (32-bit and 64-bit) such as the Raspberry Pi and the Pinebook.

Go to the latest release's page and download the suitable .deb file. If in doubt, please consult the compatibility table in the README or open an issue so we can update the table.

After downloading, you can try to open the .deb file. In most distributions, the software center should allow you to install it graphically.

If that is not possible, you can install the tool from the terminal using the following command:

# substitute your downloads folder's name, it might vary depending on your system language
# on French systems, it's usually called Téléchargements, for example
> cd ~/Downloads/
> sudo dpkg -i appimagelauncher-*.deb

If you encounter error messages regarding missing dependencies, the following commands usually fix the problem:

> sudo apt-get update
> sudo apt-get install -f

Please read the output of the commands thoroughly! Usually, they're informative!

You're done! You have successfully installed AppImageLauncher on your system. If you encounter issues directly after the installation, you can try rebooting once. If that doesn't fix your problem, please don't hesitate to open an issue.