Linux install

Contents

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
    • git 2.x
    • mkdir
    • rm
    • unzip
    • which
    • xz-utils
  • 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

Get the Flutter SDK

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

    (loading…)

    For other release channels, and older builds, see the SDK archive page.

  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, see 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, see 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 is not 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/obiwan/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://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

You can update your PATH variable for the current session at the command line, as shown in Get the Flutter SDK. You’ll probably want to update this variable permanently, so you can run flutter commands in any terminal session.

The steps for modifying this variable permanently for all terminal sessions are machine-specific. Typically you add a line to a file that is executed whenever you open a new window. For example:

  1. Determine the directory where you placed the Flutter SDK. You need this in Step 3.
  2. Open (or create) the rc file for your shell. For example, Linux uses the Bash shell by default, so edit $HOME/.bashrc. If you are using a different shell, the file path and filename will be different on your machine.

  3. Add the following line and change [PATH_TO_FLUTTER_GIT_DIRECTORY] to be the path where you cloned Flutter’s git repo:

    $ export PATH="$PATH:[PATH_TO_FLUTTER_GIT_DIRECTORY]/flutter/bin"
  4. Run source $HOME/.<rc file> to refresh the current window, or open a new terminal window to automatically source the file.

  5. Verify that the flutter/bin directory is now in your PATH by running:

    $ echo $PATH

    Verify that the flutter command is available by running:

    $ which flutter

Update path directly

In some cases, your distribution may not permanently acquire the path when using the above directions. When this occurs, you can change the environment variables file directly. These instructions require administrator privileges:

  1. Determine the directory where you placed the Flutter SDK.

  2. Locate the etc directory at the root of the system, and open the profile file with root privileges.

      $ sudo nano /etc/profile

  3. Update the PATH string with the location of your Flutter SDK directory.

    if [ "`id -u`" -eq 0 ]; then
   PATH="..."
else
   PATH="/usr/local/bin:...:[PATH_TO_FLUTTER_GIT_DIRECTORY]/flutter/bin"
fi
export PATH
  4. End the current session or reboot your system.

  5. Once you start a new session, verify that the flutter command is available by running:

    $ which flutter

For more details on setting the path in Bash, see this StackExchange question. For information on setting the path in Z shell, see this StackOverflow question.

Android setup

Install Android Studio

  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 Platform-Tools, and Android SDK Build-Tools, which are required by Flutter when developing for Android.

Set up your Android device

To prepare to run and test your Flutter app on an Android device, you’ll need an Android device running Android 4.1 (API level 16) or higher.

  1. Enable Developer options and USB debugging on your device. Detailed instructions are available in the Android documentation.
  2. Windows-only: Install the Google USB Driver.
  3. Using a USB cable, plug your phone into your computer. If prompted on your device, authorize your computer to access your device.
  4. 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_HOME environment variable to that installation directory.

Set up the Android emulator

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 > Tools > Android > AVD Manager and select Create Virtual Device. (The Android submenu is only present when inside an Android project.)
  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.

Web setup

To prepare to run and test your Flutter app on the web, you must install Chrome, if you haven’t already.

Next step

Set up your preferred editor.