Sorry to bring up an old thread. In the current pandemic more people have been asking me how to install Zwift on Linux. It's easy, using Lutris, an open app that attempts to make installs of software easier.
Zwift works in Ubuntu linux and Mint Linux. Mint is based on ubuntu kernels.
The easiest way to get this working without much effort is to do the following:
- Install Lutris from repository, following their website instructions.
- Run Lutris. Search for a game to install within the app: Zwift
- Whilst it installs, you are in for a wait. It has to download wine, winetricks and other supporting software
- Once it's finished everything, launch Zwift. A white blank window will appear. Leave this for a few hours. It will provide a progress bar of downloading the full Zwift software from Zwift servers.
- Once this is done overnight, close everything down and reboot your linux computer.
- Launch Lutris, once laptop has finished rebooting.
- Right click on the newly installed Zwift game within Lutris and select "Run EXE within WINE prefix". Navigate to 'Program Files' folder, 'Zwift' folder, and select 'ZwiftLauncher.exe'
- Wait 10 seconds or so for the Zwift system tray icon to load and for the white window to again appear.
- Now, within Lutris, click the 'Launch' button with Zwift selected. A zwift window should appear and Zwift will begin running.
- Please note that you can't pair bluetooth or ANT+ as WINE doesn't support passing through these protocols to the Zwift app, so you're going to have to use the Zwift Companion app on your mobile phone to pair bluetooth/ANT+ sensors. Remember that Android supports the ANT+ protocol AND bluetooth, whereas iOS only supports bluetooth.
If you launch 'Zwift' using the launch button and the full screen Zwift window loads blank and then exits, especially if you're running an intel integrated graphics driver, then you have to launch Lutris in a different way. It's a coding problem with the graphics driver:
- Open a terminal window
- Enter the following command and hit enter: export MESA_GL_VERSION_OVERRIDE=3.1
- in the SAME terminal window then enter: lutris
- (hit enter again. Lutris will load using the graphics version override above. Repeat the steps to run the zwiftlauncher within WINE prefix, then launch zwift manually using the 'launch' button Lutris after a short wait.)
I have been racing for hours on end with this setup and it works really well on ubuntu. If you are a masochist you can perform the individual tasks required, but Lutris does all these tasks for you, so you can make life easier for yourself by sticking with my abridged version.
Thanks.