How To Install qemu-kvm on Debian 10

Learn how to install qemu-kvm on Debian 10 with this tutorial. qemu-kvm is QEMU Full virtualization on x86 hardware

Introduction

In this tutorial we learn how to install qemu-kvm on Debian 10.

What is qemu-kvm

qemu-kvm is:

QEMU is a fast processor emulator. This package provides just a wrapper script /usr/bin/kvm which run qemu-system-x86 in kvm mode for backwards compatibility.

There are three methods to install qemu-kvm on Debian 10. We can use apt-get, apt and aptitude. In the following sections we will describe each method. You can choose one of them.

Install qemu-kvm Using apt-get

Update apt database with apt-get using the following command.

sudo apt-get update

After updating apt database, We can install qemu-kvm using apt-get by running the following command:

sudo apt-get -y install qemu-kvm

Install qemu-kvm Using apt

Update apt database with apt using the following command.

sudo apt update

After updating apt database, We can install qemu-kvm using apt by running the following command:

sudo apt -y install qemu-kvm

Install qemu-kvm Using aptitude

If you want to follow this method, you might need to install aptitude first since aptitude is usually not installed by default on Debian. Update apt database with aptitude using the following command.

sudo aptitude update

After updating apt database, We can install qemu-kvm using aptitude by running the following command:

sudo aptitude -y install qemu-kvm

How To Uninstall qemu-kvm on Debian 10

To uninstall only the qemu-kvm package we can use the following command:

sudo apt-get remove qemu-kvm

Uninstall qemu-kvm And Its Dependencies

To uninstall qemu-kvm and its dependencies that are no longer needed by Debian 10, we can use the command below:

sudo apt-get -y autoremove qemu-kvm

Remove qemu-kvm Configurations and Data

To remove qemu-kvm configuration and data from Debian 10 we can use the following command:

sudo apt-get -y purge qemu-kvm

Remove qemu-kvm configuration, data, and all of its dependencies

We can use the following command to remove qemu-kvm configurations, data and all of its dependencies, we can use the following command:

sudo apt-get -y autoremove --purge qemu-kvm

Dependencies

qemu-kvm have the following dependencies:

References

Summary

In this tutorial we learn how to install qemu-kvm package on Debian 10 using different package management tools: apt, apt-get and aptitude.