The installation of FreeCAD on the most well-known Linux systems has been now endorsed by the community, and FreeCAD should be directly available via the package manager available on your distribution. The FreeCAD team also provides some:
- "Official" packages when new releases are made
- Experimental Personal Package Archive (PPA) repositories, AppImages, and Ubuntu Snaps for testing bleeding-edge features.
Many Linux distributions are based on Ubuntu and share its repositories. Besides official variants (Kubuntu, Lubuntu and Xubuntu), there are non official derivatives like Linux Mint, Voyager and others. The installation options below should be compatible with these systems.
FreeCAD is available from the Ubuntu Universe repository, and can be installed via the Software Center or from the terminal:
sudo apt install freecadNote:
the Ubuntu Universe package may be outdated as the packaging may lag behind the latest stable source code. In this case, it is suggested to install the package from the -stable PPA below. In addition, installing the -daily package can be done to test the development branch.
Personal Package Archive (PPA) for the stable FreeCAD release is maintained by the FreeCAD community on Launchpad. The Launchpad repository is called FreeCAD Stable Releases .
Install the stable PPA via the Graphical User Interface (GUI):
: 1. Navigate to Ubuntu Software → Software & Updates → Software Sources → Other Software : 2. Click on Add, then copy and paste the following line
:
:
ppa:freecad-maintainers/freecad-stable
: 3. Add the source, close the dialog, and reload your software sources, if asked.
Now you can find and install the last stable FreeCAD version from the Ubuntu Software Center.
Install the stable PPA via the Command Line Interface (CLI):
: 1. Add the PPA to your software sources:
:
:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:freecad-maintainers/freecad-stable
: 2. Retrieve the updated package lists:
:
:
sudo apt update
: 3. Then install FreeCAD along with its offline documentation:
:
:
sudo apt install freecad freecad-doc
Note:
due to packaging problems, in certain versions of Ubuntu the freecad-doc package has collided with the installation of FreeCAD or one of its dependencies; if this is the case, remove the freecad-doc package, and only install the freecad package. If the freecad-doc package doesn't exist, then ignore it.
: 4. Once you have the stable PPA added to your sources using one of the above methods, the freecad package will install this PPA version over the one provided by the Ubuntu Universe repository. You can see the available versions with the following apt-cache command:
:
apt-cache policy freecad
: The output should look similar to the following (of course the version info will vary):
freecad:
Installed: (none)
Candidate: 2:0.18.4+dfsg1~201911060029~ubuntu18.04.1
Version table:
2:0.18.4+dfsg1~201911060029~ubuntu18.04.1 500
500 http://ppa.launchpad.net/freecad-maintainers/freecad-stable/ubuntu bionic/main amd64 Packages
0.16.6712+dfsg1-1ubuntu2 500
500 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu bionic/universe amd64 Packages
ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ apt-cache policy freecad-doc: 5. Invoke the stable (PPA) version of FreeCAD from the GUI or CLI. The latter method is as follows:
:
./freecad
As FreeCAD is in constant development, you may wish to install the daily package to keep with the latest improvements and bug fixes. The repository is also hosted on Launchpad and is called freecad-daily.
This version is compiled daily from the official master repository. Please beware that although it will contain new features and bug fixes, it may also have newer bugs, and be unstable.
Add the daily PPA to your software sources, update the package lists, and install the daily package:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:freecad-maintainers/freecad-daily
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install freecad-dailyEvery day you can update to the latest daily:
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install freecad-dailyNote:
in some cases new code or dependencies added to FreeCAD will cause packaging errors; if this happens, a daily package may not be generated until the maintainers manually fix the problems. If you wish to continue testing the latest code, you should get the source code and compile FreeCAD directly; for instructions see compiling.
Run the daily (PPA) version of FreeCAD:
:
freecad-daily
Note:
it is possible to install both the
Since Debian Lenny, FreeCAD is available directly from the Debian software repositories and can be installed via synaptic or simply with:
sudo apt-get install freecadFreeCAD is typically installed with YAST (abbr. Yet another Setup Tool) the Linux operating system setup and configuration tool, or in any terminal/console (root rights required) with:
:
zypper install FreeCAD
Note:
This procedure only covers the installation of officially released stable FreeCAD program versions, depending on the installed links to the program package repositories of your OS version. The openSUSE package may be outdated as the packaging may lag behind the latest stable source code. In this case, it is suggested to install the package manually from the below indicated (Expand) source repositories.
A vast release program for FreeCAD package builds are offered. Please visit for a survey:
Survey of repositories on openSUSE
Generally for selecting the correct openSUSE distribution needed it is necessary to click on the particular View button.
The stable package version: Stable repositories on openSUSE. The correct openSUSE distribution version must be selected in the lower part of the web page.
Note: openSUSE has several options to choose from when downloading FreeCAD. To view these options, visit Survey of stable repositories on openSUSE.
Latest development releases AKA unstable: Unstable repositories listings on openSUSE
It is recommended to grab the binary packages directly. Then select the correct distribution for your installed openSUSE OS.
FreeCAD can be built/installed simply by issuing:
emerge freecadFreeCAD has been included in the official Fedora packages since Fedora 20. It can be installed from the command line with:
sudo dnf install freecadOn older Fedora releases, that was:
sudo yum install freecadThe gui packages managers can also be used. Search for "freecad".
The official release package version tends to be well behind the FreeCAD releases. Package: freecad shows the versions included in the Fedora repositories over time and versions.
More current versions can be obtained by downloading one of the .AppImage releases from the github repository. These work fine on Fedora.
If you want to keep up with the absolute latest daily builds, FreeCAD is also available on copr . To install the build from there, in a terminal session, enter:
sudo dnf copr enable @freecad/nightly
sudo dnf install freecadThat leaves the copr repository active, so
sudo dnf upgradeor equivalent, will update to the latest FreeCAD build, along with updates from any of the other active repos. If you want something a bit more stable, you can disable @freecad/nightly again after the initial install. The copr repository only keeps builds from the past 2 weeks. This is not a solution if you want to pick a specific older version.
Instructions are also available on compile FreeCAD yourself, including a script specifically for Fedora. With a minor change, to checkout the specific commit from git, any version since about FreeCAD 0.15 can be built on any distribution since Fedora 21.
Installing FreeCAD on Arch Linux and derivatives (ex. Manjaro):
pacman -S freecadIf you find out that your system features FreeCAD but is not documented in this page, please tell us on the forum!
Many alternative, non-official FreeCAD packages are available on the net, for example for systems like slackware or fedora. A search on the net can quickly give you some results.
If for some reason you cannot use one of the above methods, you can always download one of the .deb packages available on the Download page. {{DownloadUnixStable}}
Once you downloaded the .deb corresponding to your system version, if you have the Gdebi package installed (usually it is), you just need to navigate to where you downloaded the file, and double-click on it. The necessary dependencies will be taken care of automatically by your system package manager. Alternatively you can also install it from the terminal, navigating to where you downloaded the file, and type:
sudo dpkg -i Name_of_your_FreeCAD_package.debchanging Name_of_your_FreeCAD_package.deb by the name of the file you downloaded.
After you installed FreeCAD, a startup icon will be added in the "Graphic" section of your Start Menu.
Many common Linux distros now include a precompiled FreeCAD as part of the standard packages. This is often out of date, but is a place to start. Check the standard package managers for your system. One of the following (partial) list of commands could install the official version of FreeCAD for your distro from the terminal. These probably need administrator privileges.
apt-get install freecad
dnf install freecad
emerge freecad
slackpkg install freecad
yum install freecad
zypper install freecadThe package name is case sensitive, so try [.AppImage](https://github.com/FreeCAD/FreeCAD/releases/) releases from the github repository. These tend to work on most 64 bit Linux distributions, without any special installation. Just make sure the downloaded file is marked as executable, then run it.
If that still is not good enough, and you cannot locate another source of a precompiled package for your situation, you will need to compile FreeCAD yourself.
See the Installing on Windows page.
Once you've got FreeCAD installed, it's time to get started!
Category:Common Questions Category:Developer Documentation
documentation index > [Common Questions](Category:Common Questions.md) > Installing on Linux