How to install a deb file in Linux Ubuntu/Debian ?

In this article, you will learn how to install and remove deb packages in Ubuntu. Deb packages are files which have the extension .deb much like .exe in windows. Once you click on a .deb file, it will launch an installation procedure of the corresponding application.

How to install deb files?

You can install deb files in many ways in Ubuntu. We will outline below some of these methods.

A : Using the Ubuntu Software application

Using the default Ubuntu Software application is the simplest most common method to use. You would just need to open up the folder where the downloaded .deb file is located and then simply double click on it.

This will display the Ubuntu Software application window in which you will see a button to install the application. Go ahead and press that button. You would need to enter your login password when prompted.

B : Using Gdebi

When installing software packages via the Software Center you may encounter a dependency error which means that the program being installed may depend on another program (libraries) for it to run smoothly. In case your system does not have the second program on which your software is dependent on, you will receive the error : Unmet dependencies error. Since the Software Center is not able to deal with this error, you would have to use another utility called gdebi.

gdebi is a GUI application with a lightweight interface that is used to install deb packages. It has the ability to detect the dependencies and attempts to install them when you try to install the .deb packages.

It gdebi is not installed on your Ubuntu, you should be able to perform the installation by running the following command:

sudo apt install gdebi

Once done, you should now be able to install your deb package with gdebi by executing the command below:

sudo gdebi your_deb_package.deb

C : Using dpkg

If you are used to working with the command line or the terminal, you can run either of the commands apt or dpkg.

In case you want to execute the apt command to install deb files, proceed as follows :

sudo apt install deb_file

With dpkg command, you can do this :

sudo dpkg -i deb_file

Of course you would have to replace deb_file with your own deb file that you have downloaded.

Conclusion :

You have learned how to install a deb package using the command line or the terminal and also using the Ubuntu Software Center. Sometimes a dependency error arises since the application being installed is dependent on other programs that are not installed or that are not found on your system. In this case, you could use the gdebi application which attempts to solve this problem. If the issue persists however you may want to view this guide on how to solve it.