QCAD on Linux

This page is for users of the Linux operating system, using the .run installer or a tar.gz archive.

For brevity, version numbers below are shown as 3.x.x. Replace this with the actual version number of the QCAD release you downloaded, for example 3.28.2.

Getting the correct installation file

The installer for Linux is called QCAD Professional 3.x.x for Linux 32bit (Installer) / file name qcad-3.x.x-pro-linux-x86_32.run, or QCAD Professional 3.x.x for Linux 64bit (Installer) / file name qcad-3.x.x-pro-linux-qt5.14-x86_64.run, depending on the architecture of your Linux system (32-bit or 64-bit).

For older 64-bit Linux distributions, you might have to use the installer QCAD Professional 3.x.x for Linux Older Distributions 64bit (Installer) / file name qcad-3.x.x-pro-linux-x86_64.run instead, which provides better compatibility with these distributions.

Alternatively, there are also tar.gz archives for advanced users who wish to install QCAD manually.

Installation using the installer (.run)

The recommended way to install QCAD on Linux is on the console. Open a console application such as Konsole or xterm. If you have a USB drive, insert it and copy the correct file to your hard disk, for example:

cd /mnt/cdrom/installation/linux
cp qcad-3.x.x-pro-linux-x86_64.run /home/myname

Replace myname with your login name. The exact mount location of your USB drive depends on your Linux distribution. Navigate to where you copied or downloaded the file:

cd /home/myname

Now make the file executable and run it:

chmod a+x qcad-3.x.x-pro-linux-x86_64.run
./qcad-3.x.x-pro-linux-x86_64.run

This creates the directory /home/myname/opt/qcad-3.x.x-pro-linux-x86_64, which contains the QCAD application.

Installation using the tar.gz archive

Extract the tar.gz file into any directory of your choice, for example /home/myname/opt:

cd /home/myname/opt
tar xfvz qcad-3.x.x-pro-linux-x86_64.tar.gz

Launching QCAD

Change to the directory where you installed QCAD and launch it from there:

cd /home/myname/opt/qcad-3.x.x-pro-linux-x86_64
./qcad

Troubleshooting

If QCAD does not run, you might be missing some dependencies (required system libraries). Check for unmet dependencies as follows:

cd ~/opt/qcad-3.x.x-pro-linux-x86_64
LD_LIBRARY_PATH=. ldd qcad-bin

If you get any “Not found” messages, install the appropriate packages / libraries first.

Uninstalling

When using the QCAD installer, QCAD installs into ~/opt (the opt directory in your home folder). To uninstall, simply remove the QCAD installation directory, for example ~/opt/qcad-3.x.x-pro-linux-x86_64.