This guide provides an end-to-end workflow for successfully running Unreal Engine 5.7 Editor in almost any modern Linux distribution using containes. This method solves the perennial problem of dependency conflicts and operating system fragmentation that often prevents developers from launching the UE Editor outside of officially recommended environments.
https://dev.epicgames.com/community/learning/tutorials/KWvY/metahuman-the-easiest-way-to-run-unreal-engine-5-7-natively-on-any-linux-distro
I love this, thank you!
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I tried this on Fedora 42 running an Xorg session and it looks good so far.
Does this method work well if my host machine is running Wayland? Should I upgrade to Fedora 43 it would be Wayland only, as I understand it.
EDIT - the means of finding out may have been in my hands all along.
Being in Fedora 42 I could simply start up a Wayland session and try it. So I did and it does work.
The one thing I am not getting yet is use of my sound device.
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I’ve done all the steps and UE5 opens up.
The only major issue is that after a short while, the keyboard stops working for the engine.
Any clue why?
Great tutorial, but I would add one thing.
At first, it was defaulting to my integrated graphics instead of using the discrete GPU
Instead of:
distrobox create --name rocky8-box --image quay.io/rockylinux/rockylinux:8
use this for nvidia cards:
distrobox create --name rocky8-box --image quay.io/rockylinux/rockylinux:8 --nvidia
I do not know the code for AMD. Maybe chatbot the answer.
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Using AMD here - the one change I had to make was using Rocky 9 instead of 8. The version of mesa (AMD drivers) that comes with 8 is too old for 5.7.4. Otherwise this worked great!
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Is there a way to get Fab working? I am unable to sign in to Fab via the engine using Distrobox. It says, Please sign in using the browser, but no browser pops up”
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also ı am here for fab library. my machine is debian 13 and ı am use with distrobox rockylinux for ue5. but ı can’t use fab. if there was a knowledge share with me please. thank you
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You are an absolute saint
@acroviastudio Yes, please update the article with that little thing 
--nvidia is necessary when creating the distrobox and you’re using their GPU. Thx for the article, perfection
Step 1 instructions on ubuntu dont work at all lol. Get this vibecoded trash out of here.
ca-certificates is already the newest version (20240203).
curl is already the newest version (8.5.0-2ubuntu10.9).
gnupg is already the newest version (2.4.4-2ubuntu17.4).
chmod: cannot access '/etc/apt/keyrings/docker.gpg': No such file or directory
Reading package lists... Done
E: The method driver /usr/lib/apt/methods/[https could not be found.
N: Is the package apt-transport-[https installed?
E: Failed to fetch [https://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu](https://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu)/dists/zena/InRelease
E: Some index files failed to download. They have been ignored, or old ones used instead.
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree... Done
Reading state information... Done
Package docker-ce is not available, but is referred to by another package.
This may mean that the package is missing, has been obsoleted, or
is only available from another source
Package docker-ce-cli is not available, but is referred to by another package.
This may mean that the package is missing, has been obsoleted, or
is only available from another source
E: Package 'docker-ce' has no installation candidate
E: Package 'docker-ce-cli' has no installation candidate
E: Unable to locate package containerd.io
E: Couldn't find any package by glob 'containerd.io'
E: Unable to locate package docker-buildx-plugin
E: Unable to locate package docker-compose-plugin
I’ve gotten UE5 Linux to run perfectly on any distro.
I use:
“SDL_MOUSE_FOCUS_CLICKTHROUGH=1 SDL_HINT_VIDEO_X11_NET_WM_BYPASS_COMPOSITOR=0 __NV_PRIME_RENDER_OFFLOAD=1 prime-run /pathToFolder/Linux_Unreal_Engine_5.8.0/Engine/Binaries/Linux/UnrealEditor’”
prime-run is a package you have to install.
The others help Unreal run better on Wayland since it was originally built for x11.
Hope this helps.
Sorry, that was intended for the Ubuntu 22 image; I’ve updated it for the latest version. Not an AI fan, but thanks for the feedback. Have a good day.
Great walkthrough @acroviastudio! I’m following your guide and just wanted to share a handful of things I tripped over while installing on Pop!_OS
Optional : Boxbuddy Installation
The links in this section are incorrect. You link to com.github.Mister-Muffin.BoxBuddy, but Mister-Muffin doesn’t have that project in their github. It should be changed to:
flatpak install flathub io.github.dvlv.boxbuddyrs
flatpak run io.github.dvlv.boxbuddyrs
Step 3: Install Distrobox
(under 1. Debian/Ubuntu/Linux Mint and 4. Generic/Fallback)
It looks like some markdown snuck into the code. Your current code:
curl -s [https://raw.githubusercontent.com/89luca89/distrobox/main/install](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/89luca89/distrobox/main/install) | sudo sh
# bash: syntax error near unexpected token `('
Looks like it should be:
curl -s https://raw.githubusercontent.com/89luca89/distrobox/main/install | sudo sh
I’m guessing @Johnstonedhard tripped over a bad markdown url last month while downloading docker, but it looks like you fixed that!
Step 1: Download Unreal Engine 5.7
Maybe another markdown error. The download link doesn’t work when you click on it. Looking at the html, the text is correct but it links to “https://**(https//**www.unrealengine.com/en-US/linux”
NVIDIA and AMD
Already mentioned, folks should add the nvidia flag if you have an NVIDIA card:
distrobox create --name rocky8 --image rockylinux:8 --nvidia
Apparently, you don’t need any flag for AMD as it should just work out the box, but sounds like AMD users should use rocky 9 since it includes newer drivers:
distrobox create --name rocky9 --image rockylinux:9
That said, is there a reason not to use rocky 9 in general? i.e. rockylinux:9 --nvidia. Might be worth testing.
And that’s all I found!