Discord is a wildly popular text and voice chat application. Though it began life catering primarily to gamers, it has gained widespread favor across nearly all audiences.
Discord isn’t just a great chat client. When you install it you also get its powerful server capabilities, batteries included. Gamers and non-gamers alike can spin up their own private chat servers in minutes, making Discord an obvious choice for teams, guilds, and all sorts of communities.
All too often, Linux users are left out in the gaming world. That’s not the case with Discord. Its developers actively build and maintain their popular chat platform for Linux too. Ubuntu users have it even better. Discord is bundled in a convenient Debian/Ubuntu .deb package.
Get and Install the Packages
There are a couple of ways that you can get Discord for Ubuntu. You can take a look at both and choose the one that you’re more comfortable with.
Dependencies
There isn’t anything on Discord’s download page about them, but there are a couple of dependencies that you need before you can install it on Ubuntu. It’s not a big deal. Open up your terminal and enter in the following command to get what you need:
sudo apt install libgconf-2-4 libappindicator1
Graphical Install
The graphical install process takes a bit longer, but it also tends to be simpler for newer Linux users.
Start by heading over to the Discord website. The site should automatically detect that you’re running Linux and suggest the correct package right in the main section of the page.
If it doesn’t, just scroll down a bit. The next section of the page shows the other available downloads, and Linux will be there.
Once you’ve found the download link for Linux, check to see that “deb” is selected, and click the “Download” button.
Your browser will ask if you would prefer to open the file with the Ubuntu software installer or download the file. You can do either, but it is quicker to automatically open the package with the software installer.
The download is fairly quick, so the installer will open right up and allow you the option of installing your newly-downloaded package. It’s a fairly plain window without a nice icon or a lot of descriptive text, so don’t be put off by that. It’s normal. Click “Install” to begin the installation.
The install process won’t take long. Afterward, Discord will be available and ready to use.
Command Line Install
Lazy Linux veterans don’t care much for fancy GUI tools. If you fall into this camp, there’s a more direct command line option for you.
First, open up a terminal and change into your download directory. From there, you can use wget to grab the .deb package directly.
cd ~/Downloads wget -O discord-0.0.1.deb https://discordapp.com/api/download?platform=linux&format=deb
When the download completes, you can use dpkg to install the .deb package directly. Run the following command:
sudo dpkg -i discord-0.0.1.deb
Testing It Out
Now you can open your software launcher and search for Discord. Click the icon to launch it.
On your first run you will be prompted to create an account or sign in. Do whichever you need to.
After you sign in, you’ll be dropped right in to Discord. It will offer some introductory tutorials and advice. You can jump right in and play around, though. Welcome to your new Linux chat experience!
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