How To Install Wine 6 on CentOS 8 Desktop

Let’s capture the steps required to install Wine 6 on CentOS 8 Desktop. Wine is an open source software solution that enables Linux users to run Microsoft Windows applications as if they’re working on a Windows machine. As of this article writing the latest stable release of Wine is version 6. This release is available for installation and it comes with large number of improvements which includes:

• Vulkan backend for WineD3D
• DirectShow and Media Foundation support
• Text console redesign
• USB kernel driver
• Mouse position history
• Plug & Play device notifications
• WebSocket API
• Initial support for Apple Silicon

I couldn’t find any RPM repository which contains Wine 6 packages. This leaves us with an option of installing Wine 6 on CentOS 8 Desktop system by building the software from source.

You’ll need a console or ssh access to the system as user with sudo permissions or root. An internet connectivity is also required for packages installation and downloading Wine tar file.

Step 1: Update System

Updating your system is another way of validating working package management system on CentOS 8 system.

sudo dnf -y update

As always we reboot the system after upgrades.

sudo reboot

Step 2: Install Software Building dependencies

Install Development Tools on CentOS 8:

sudo dnf groupinstall 'Development Tools' -y

Enable EPEL and PowerTools repositories:

sudo dnf -y install epel-release
sudo dnf config-manager --set-enabled powertools

Install other build dependencies:

sudo yum -y install libxslt-devel libpng-devel libX11-devel zlib-devel libtiff-devel freetype-devel libxcb-devel  libxml2-devel libgcrypt-devel dbus-devel libjpeg-turbo-devel  fontconfig-devel gnutls-devel gstreamer1-devel libXcursor-devel libXi-devel libXrandr-devel libXfixes-devel libXinerama-devel libXcomposite-devel mesa-libOSMesa-devel libpcap-devel libusb-devel libv4l-devel libgphoto2-devel gstreamer1-devel libgudev SDL2-devel gsm-devel libvkd3d-devel libudev-devel 

Step 3: Install Wine 6 on CentOS 8 Desktop

If wget is missing in the packages installed on the system install it.

sudo dnf -y install wget

Then use curl to pull latest release of Wine 6 archive.

curl -O https://dl.winehq.org/wine/source/6.x/wine-6.11.tar.xz

Extract the file downloaded using tar.

tar xvf wine-6.11.tar.xz

Compile and build Wine 6 on CentOS 8:

cd wine-6.11
./configure --enable-win64 
make
sudo make install

Step 4: Confirm Wine 6 installation on CentOS 8

Verify installation of Wine 6 on CentOS 8 by checking the version:

$ wine64 --version

For basic usage of wine, check help page.

$ wine --help

Example below is used to run Notepad++ editor on Linux.

$ cd ~/Downloads
wget https://notepad-plus-plus.org/repository/7.x/7.7/npp.7.7.Installer.exe
wine64 ./npp.7.7.Installer.exe

Follow installation prompts like for any other Windows application.

Similar wine installation guides:

How To Install Wine on Ubuntu

How To Install Wine on Debian

How To Install Wine on Fedora