Oracle VirtualBox is a powerful x86 and AMD64/Intel64 virtualization product for enterprise as well as home use. VirtualBox is a general-purpose full virtualizer for x86 hardware. Targeted at server, desktop and embedded use, it is now the only professional-quality virtualization solution that is also Open Source Software.
VirtualBox supports a large number of guest operating systems:
- Windows 3.x
- Windows NT 4.0
- Windows 2000
- Windows XP
- Windows Server 2003
- Windows Server 2008
- Windows Vista
- Windows 7
- Windows 8
- Windows 8.1
- Windows 10
- DOS
- Linux (Kernel 2.4, 2.6, 3.0, 3.2, 3.4, 3.10, 3.16, 3.18, 4.1, 4.4, 4.7, 4.8, 4.9, 4.10, 4.11, 4.12, 4.13, 4.14, 4.15, 4.16, 4.17, 4.18, 4.19, 4.20, 5.0, 5.1, 5.2, 5.3, 5.4, 5.5, 5.6, 5.7)
- Solaris
- OpenSolaris
- OpenBSD
This guide shows howto install VirtualBox 6.1 (currently 6.1.10) on Fedora 32/31/30/29, CentOS 8.0/7.7, Red Hat (RHEL) 8.0/7.7. This guide uses Virtual Box own yum repositories.
1. Change to root User
su -
## OR ##
sudo -i
2. Install Fedora or RHEL Repo Files
Note: CentOS 8/RHEL 8 users, install this, but you still need test build currently.
cd /etc/yum.repos.d/
## Fedora 32/31/30/29 users
wget http://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/rpm/fedora/virtualbox.repo
## CentOS 8.0/7.7 and Red Hat (RHEL) 8.0/7.7 users
wget http://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/rpm/rhel/virtualbox.repo
3. Update latest packages and check your kernel version
Update packages
## Fedora 32/31/30/29 and CentOS/RHEL 8 ##
dnf update
## CentOS/RHEL 7 ##
yum update
Check that that you are running latest installed kernel version
Output of following commands version numbers should match:
rpm -qa kernel |sort -V |tail -n 1
uname -r
Note: If you got kernel update or run older kernel than newest installed then reboot:
reboot
4. Install following dependency packages
CentOS 8/7 and Red Hat (RHEL) 8/7 needs EPEL repository, install it with following command:
## CentOS 8 and RHEL 8 ##
dnf install https://dl.fedoraproject.org/pub/epel/epel-release-latest-8.noarch.rpm
## CentOS 7 and RHEL 7 ##
rpm -Uvh https://dl.fedoraproject.org/pub/epel/epel-release-latest-7.noarch.rpm
## Fedora 32/31/30/29 ##
dnf install binutils gcc make patch libgomp glibc-headers glibc-devel kernel-headers kernel-devel dkms qt5-qtx11extras libxkbcommon
## CentOS/RHEL 8 ##
dnf install binutils gcc make patch libgomp glibc-headers glibc-devel kernel-headers kernel-devel dkms
## CentOS/RHEL 7 ##
yum install binutils gcc make patch libgomp glibc-headers glibc-devel kernel-headers kernel-devel dkms
5. Install VirtualBox Latest Version 6.1 (currently 6.1.10)
## Fedora 32/31/30/29 ##
dnf install VirtualBox-6.1
## CentOS/RHEL 8 ##
dnf install VirtualBox-6.1
## CentOS/RHEL 7 ##
yum install VirtualBox-6.1
Note:
This command create automatically vboxusers group and VirtualBox user must be member of that group.
This command also build needed kernel modules.
Package is VirtualBox-6.1 not VirtualBox.
Rebuild kernel modules with following command:
## Fedora 32/31/30/29 and CentOS/RHEL 8/7 ##
/usr/lib/virtualbox/vboxdrv.sh setup
6. Add VirtualBox User(s) to vboxusers Group
Replace user_name with your own user name or some another real user name.
usermod -a -G vboxusers user_name
7. Start VirtualBox
Use launcher from menu or simply run VirtualBox as normal user:
VirtualBox
Troubleshooting
If you have problems with KERN_DIR parameter or your kernel directory is not automatically detected then set KERN_DIR environment variable manually, using following method:
## Current running kernel on Fedora, CentOS 8 and Red Hat (RHEL) 8 ##
KERN_DIR=/usr/src/kernels/`uname -r`
## Current running kernel on CentOS 7/6 and Red Hat (RHEL) 7/6 ##
KERN_DIR=/usr/src/kernels/`uname -r`-`uname -m`
## Fedora example ##
KERN_DIR=/usr/src/kernels/2.6.33.5-124.fc13.i686
## CentOS and Red Hat (RHEL) example ##
KERN_DIR=/usr/src/kernels/2.6.18-194.11.1.el5-x86_64
## Export KERN_DIR ##
export KERN_DIR
Check also:
Install VirtualBox Guest Additions on Fedora, CentOS, Red Hat (RHEL)
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