In this guide, we will cover how to install virtualbox on Debian 11 (Bullseye) step-by-step.

VirtualBox is a free and open-source virtualization software used at desktop level. It is available for both Linux and Windows operating system. VirtualBox allows to spin up multiple virtual machines of different operating systems. It is used to setup test environment on laptop or desktop by creating virtual machines.

Prerequisites

  • Pre-Installed Debian 11
  • User with sudo rights
  • Internet connectivity

Without any further delay, let’s dive into VirtualBox installation steps.

Step1) Add VirtualBox Repository

VirtualBox debian package is not included in the default package repositories, so we to have add its official repository.

Login to your Debian 11 system and open the terminal and run the following commands to import gpg key of Virtualbox repository.

$ sudo apt install curl wget gnupg2 lsb-release -y
$ curl -fsSL https://www.virtualbox.org/download/oracle_vbox_2016.asc|sudo gpg --dearmor -o /etc/apt/trusted.gpg.d/vbox.gpg
$ curl -fsSL https://www.virtualbox.org/download/oracle_vbox.asc|sudo gpg --dearmor -o /etc/apt/trusted.gpg.d/oracle_vbox.gpg

Now, run beneath command to add repository

$ echo "deb [arch=amd64] http://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/debian $(lsb_release -cs) contrib" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/virtualbox.list

Step 2) Install VirtualBox with apt command

Run the following apt command to install latest virtualbox,

$ sudo apt update
$ sudo apt install linux-headers-$(uname -r) dkms -y
$ sudo apt install virtualbox-6.1 -y

Once the installation is completed, try to launch it in the next step.

Step 3) Launch VirtualBox

Search virtualbox from Activity as shown below,

Search-VirtualBox-Activity-Debian11

Click on VirtualBox Icon

VirtualBox-GUI-Debian11

Perfect, above confirms that virtualbox has been launched successfully. To add some additional features to virtualbox then install it’s extension pack.

Step 4) Install VirtualBox Extension Pack

Virtualbox extension pack will add following features to virtualbox :

  • Support for USB 2.0/3.0
  • VirtualBox RDP
  • Disk encryption
  • NVMe and PXE boot for Intel cards

Use following wget command to download extension pack file.

$ wget https://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/6.1.38/Oracle_VM_VirtualBox_Extension_Pack-6.1.38.vbox-extpack

Once the file is downloaded then run below vboxmanage command to install it.

$ sudo vboxmanage extpack install Oracle_VM_VirtualBox_Extension_Pack-6.1.38.vbox-extpack

It will prompt you to accept license terms and conditions. Press ‘y’ to accept and finish installation

Accept-extension-pack-license-terms-conditions-debian11

To validate extension pack installation, head back to virtualbox gui,

Go to File –> Preferences –> Extensions

Validate-Extension-Pack-Debian11

That’s all from this tutorial, I hope you guys got an idea how to install virtualbox and its extension pack on Debian 11. Please do share your queries and feedback in below comments section.

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