Linux install

System requirements

To install and run Flutter, your development environment must meet these minimum requirements:

  • Operating Systems: Linux (64-bit)
  • Disk Space: 600 MB (does not include disk space for IDE/tools).
  • Tools: Flutter depends on these command-line tools being available in your environment.
    • bash
    • curl
    • file
    • git 2.x
    • mkdir
    • rm
    • unzip
    • which
    • xz-utils
    • zip
  • Shared libraries: Flutter test command depends on this library being available in your environment.
    • libGLU.so.1 - provided by mesa packages such as libglu1-mesa on Ubuntu/Debian and mesa-libGLU on Fedora.

Get the Flutter SDK

On Linux, you have two ways you can install Flutter.

Install Flutter using snapd

The easiest way to install Flutter on Linux is by using snapd. For more information, check out Installing snapd.

Once you have snapd, you can install Flutter using the Snap Store, or at the command line:

$ sudo snap install flutter --classic

Install Flutter manually

If you don’t have snapd, or can’t use it, you can install Flutter using the following steps.

  1. Download the following installation bundle to get the latest stable release of the Flutter SDK:

    (loading…)

    For other release channels, and older builds, check out the SDK archive.

  2. Extract the file in the desired location. For example:

    $ cd ~/development
    $ tar xf ~/Downloads/flutter_linux_vX.X.X-stable.tar.xz
    
  3. Add the flutter tool to your path:

    $ export PATH="$PATH:`pwd`/flutter/bin"
    

    This command sets your PATH variable for the current terminal window only. To permanently add Flutter to your path, check out Update your path.

  4. Optionally, pre-download development binaries:

    The flutter tool downloads platform-specific development binaries as needed. For scenarios where pre-downloading these artifacts is preferable (for example, in hermetic build environments, or with intermittent network availability), iOS and Android binaries can be downloaded ahead of time by running:

    $ flutter precache
    

    For additional download options, check out flutter help precache.

You are now ready to run Flutter commands!

Run flutter doctor

Run the following command to see if there are any dependencies you need to install to complete the setup (for verbose output, add the -v flag):

$ flutter doctor

This command checks your environment and displays a report to the terminal window. The Dart SDK is bundled with Flutter; it isn’t necessary to install Dart separately. Check the output carefully for other software you might need to install or further tasks to perform (shown in bold text).

For example:

[-] Android toolchain - develop for Android devices
    • Android SDK at /Users/dash/Library/Android/sdk
    ✗ Android SDK is missing command line tools; download from https://goo.gl/XxQghQ
    • Try re-installing or updating your Android SDK,
      visit https://docs.flutter.dev/setup/#android-setup for detailed instructions.

The following sections describe how to perform these tasks and finish the setup process.

Once you have installed any missing dependencies, run the flutter doctor command again to verify that you’ve set everything up correctly.

Update your path

Independent of how you installed Flutter, you need to add the Flutter SDK to your PATH. You can add Flutter to your PATH either for the current session or for all sessions going forward.

Update your path for the current session only

To update your PATH variable for the current session, enter this command in your terminal:

$ export PATH="$PATH:[PATH_TO_FLUTTER_GIT_DIRECTORY]/flutter/bin"

In this command, replace [PATH_TO_FLUTTER_GIT_DIRECTORY] with the path to your Flutter SDK install.

Update your path for all future sessions

To add Flutter to your PATH for any terminal session, follow these steps:

  1. Find your Flutter SDK installation path.

     $ find / -type d -name "flutter/bin" 2>/dev/null
    

    Response should resemble:

     /usr/<example>dev/flutter/bin
    
  2. Append the following line to your rc shell file Linux reads the rc shell “resource” file each time it opens a terminal.

    Replace <path_to_flutter_directory> with your Flutter path

     $ echo 'export PATH="$PATH:<path_to_flutter_directory>/flutter/bin"' >> $HOME/.bashrc
    
  3. Reload the current shell profile.

     source $HOME/.<rc file>
    
  4. Verify that the flutter/bin directory exists in your PATH.

     $ echo $PATH
    

    Response should resemble:

     /usr/<example>/dev/flutter/bin:/usr/local/git/git-google/bin:/usr/local/git/current/bin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/usr/sbin:/sbin:
    
  5. Verify that you can now use the flutter command.

     $ which flutter
    

    Response should resemble:

       /usr/<example>/dev/flutter/bin/flutter
    

Android setup

Install Android Studio

help Help

  1. Download and install Android Studio.
  2. Start Android Studio, and go through the ‘Android Studio Setup Wizard’. This installs the latest Android SDK, Android SDK Command-line Tools, and Android SDK Build-Tools, which are required by Flutter when developing for Android.
  3. Run flutter doctor to confirm that Flutter has located your installation of Android Studio. If Flutter cannot locate it, run flutter config --android-studio-dir=<directory> to set the directory that Android Studio is installed to.

Set up your Android device

help Help

To prepare to run and test your Flutter app on an Android device, you need an Android device running Android 5.0 (API level 21) or higher.

  1. Enable Developer options and USB debugging on your device. Detailed instructions are available in the Android documentation.
  2. [Optional] To leverage wireless debugging, enable Wireless debugging on your device. Detailed instructions are available in the Android documentation.
  3. Windows-only: Install the Google USB Driver.
  4. Using a USB cable, plug your phone into your computer. If prompted on your device, authorize your computer to access your device.
  5. In the terminal, run the flutter devices command to verify that Flutter recognizes your connected Android device. By default, Flutter uses the version of the Android SDK where your adb tool is based. If you want Flutter to use a different installation of the Android SDK, you must set the ANDROID_SDK_ROOT environment variable to that installation directory.

Set up the Android emulator

help Help

To prepare to run and test your Flutter app on the Android emulator, follow these steps:

  1. Enable VM acceleration on your machine.
  2. Launch Android Studio, click the Device Manager icon, and select Create Device under Virtual tab…
    • In older versions of Android Studio, you should instead launch Android Studio > Tools > Android > AVD Manager and select Create Virtual Device…. (The Android submenu is only present when inside an Android project.)
    • If you do not have a project open, you can choose 3-Dot Menu / More Actions > Virtual Device Manager and select Create Device…
  3. Choose a device definition and select Next.
  4. Select one or more system images for the Android versions you want to emulate, and select Next. An x86 or x86_64 image is recommended.
  5. Under Emulated Performance, select Hardware - GLES 2.0 to enable hardware acceleration.
  6. Verify the AVD configuration is correct, and select Finish.

    For details on the above steps, see Managing AVDs.

  7. In Android Virtual Device Manager, click Run in the toolbar. The emulator starts up and displays the default canvas for your selected OS version and device.

Agree to Android Licenses

help Help

Before you can use Flutter, you must agree to the licenses of the Android SDK platform. This step should be done after you have installed the tools listed above.

  1. Open an elevated console window and run the following command to begin signing licenses.
    $ flutter doctor --android-licenses
    
  2. Review the terms of each license carefully before agreeing to them.
  3. Once you are done agreeing with licenses, run flutter doctor again to confirm that you are ready to use Flutter.

Linux setup

Linux prerequisites

To develop Linux desktop apps with Flutter, you need the following tools:

To install each of the tools, run the following command:

$ sudo apt-get install clang cmake ninja-build pkg-config libgtk-3-dev liblzma-dev libstdc++-12-dev

Next step

Set up your preferred editor.