How To Install Wine And Run Windows Apps In Linux

​All kinds of software are currently available on Linux but every now and then, there is that Windows software or Game which is not available or has no equivalent on Linux  Wine makes it possible to run those Windows programs and Games on your Linux desktop. So let’s look at how to install Wine on Linux and run Windows apps on Linux desktop.

How to install Wine in Linux?

Installing a package on a fresh system is remarkably straightforward. Just download the package available for your distro and install it using your systems installation utility. Wine works on a huge amount of different Linux distributions and installing Wine should be no more difficult than installing any other software. Chances are that there is a Wine package in your software app for easy installation.

Or you can follow the steps below to install from the PPA.

Install Wine on Fedora or Derivatives

Fedora 24

dnf config-manager --add-repo https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/fedora/24/winehq.repo

Fedora 25

dnf config-manager --add-repo https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/fedora/25/winehq.repo

Fedora 26

dnf config-manager --add-repo https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/fedora/26/winehq.repo

Install one of the following packages:

Stable branch
dnf install winehq-stable

Development branch
dnf install winehq-devel

Staging branch
dnf install winehq-staging

Install Wine on Ubuntu or Derivatives

If your system is 64 bit, enable 32-bit architecture (if you haven't already):

sudo dpkg --add-architecture i386

Add the repository:

wget -nc https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/Release.key
sudo apt-key add Release.key
sudo apt-add-repository https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/ubuntu/

On Linux Mint 17.x, change the last line to the following:

sudo apt-add-repository 'deb https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/ubuntu/ trusty main'

On Linux Mint 18.x, change the last line to the following:

sudo apt-add-repository 'deb https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/ubuntu/ xenial main'
sudo apt-get update

Then install one of the following packages:

Stable branch
sudo apt-get install --install-recommends winehq-stable

Development branch
sudo apt-get install --install-recommends winehq-devel

Staging branch
sudo apt-get install --install-recommends winehq-staging

If there are missing dependencies reported by apt-get, install them and do the update and install again.

How to use Wine?

After installation, you may run below command to initialize your wine configuration. You may be required to install other packages which is required for Windows applications to work well such as Mono and Gecko.

winecfg

Installation of Windows Apps in Linux

Most binary Wine packages will associate Wine with .exe files for you. So you can double click on the .exe file and run it just like you would on Windows. You can also right-click on the file, choose "Run with", and choose "Wine".  Also, check out the Wine Application Database to see which apps work with Wine and how easy it is to set them up.

​Launching .exe files through your file manager as described above is generally only needed for installers and simple executables that do not have installers.

Your installed applications are organized in the same way as it would when installing in WIndows. You can just accept the defaults for where to install, most installers will default to C:\Program Files, which should be ok. Your installed applications will then have in the following location Applications/ Wine / Programs menu, and there will be an icon on the desktop, just as it would under Windows. You should be able to use them just as you would on Windows.

If you have the app icon available on the desktop, you can start the app by clicking on them.

Conclusion

​So there you have it, a quick guide on setting up Wine on Linux. You can now run those essential Windows programs and games on your Linux desktop. Not every Windows software or application but many important ones can be installed via Wine. Remember Wine Is Not an Emulator (WINE) so you get a pretty great experience. Thanks for reading and share your thoughts with us in the comments below.