Building and installing for UTM virtual machine on Apple Silicon Mac
virtio_*
build targets are built by LineageOS build servers, and no OTA updates will be delivered to builds of these targets. As such, you must build all images and update the builds manually.Known issues
Please refer to here.
Introduction
Similar to libvirt QEMU virtual machine, this also offers a LineageOS experience inside a QEMU-based virtual machine.
The UTM app is a popular non-commercial virtual machine app made for Apple iOS and macOS, built on QEMU.
Note that we currently only document this for the use on Apple Silicon Macs.
The virtio_*
targets are also suitable for use in a UTM virtual machine.
What you’ll need
- A relatively recent x86_64 computer:
- Linux, macOS, or Windows - these build instructions are only tested using Ubuntu 20.04 LTS, so we recommend going with that.
- A reasonable amount of RAM (16 GB to build up to
lineage-17.1
, 32 GB or more forlineage-18.1
and up). The less RAM you have, the longer the build will take. Enabling ZRAM can be helpful. - A reasonable amount of Storage (200 GB to build up to
lineage-17.1
, 300 GB forlineage-18.1
and up). You might require more free space for enablingccache
or building for multiple devices. Using SSDs results in considerably faster build times than traditional hard drives.
- A decent internet connection and reliable electricity. :)
- Some familiarity with basic Android operation and terminology.
It may be useful to know some basic command line concepts such as
cd
, which stands for “change directory”, the concept of directory hierarchies, and that in Linux they are separated by/
, etc.
Let’s begin!
Build LineageOS
Install the platform-tools
If you haven’t previously installed adb
and fastboot
, you can download them from Google.
Extract it running:
unzip platform-tools-latest-linux.zip -d ~
Now you have to add adb
and fastboot
to your PATH. Open ~/.profile
and add the following:
# add Android SDK platform tools to path
if [ -d "$HOME/platform-tools" ] ; then
PATH="$HOME/platform-tools:$PATH"
fi
Then, run source ~/.profile
to update your environment.
Install the build packages
Several packages are needed to build LineageOS. You can install these using your distribution’s package manager.
apt install
command directly in the Terminal.To build LineageOS, you’ll need:
bc bison build-essential ccache curl flex g++-multilib gcc-multilib git git-lfs gnupg gperf imagemagick lib32readline-dev lib32z1-dev libelf-dev liblz4-tool lz4 libsdl1.2-dev libssl-dev libxml2 libxml2-utils lzop pngcrush rsync schedtool squashfs-tools xsltproc zip zlib1g-dev
Since LineageOS 22.0 the virtio_*
targets use a Mesa that is based on upstream repository. To build LineageOS 22.0 and above for the virtio_*
targets, you’ll also need:
meson glslang-tools python3-mako
For Ubuntu 23.10 (mantic), install libncurses5
from 23.04 (lunar) as follows:
wget https://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/universe/n/ncurses/libtinfo5_6.3-2_amd64.deb && sudo dpkg -i libtinfo5_6.3-2_amd64.deb && rm -f libtinfo5_6.3-2_amd64.deb
wget https://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/universe/n/ncurses/libncurses5_6.3-2_amd64.deb && sudo dpkg -i libncurses5_6.3-2_amd64.deb && rm -f libncurses5_6.3-2_amd64.deb
While for Ubuntu versions older than 23.10 (mantic), simply install:
lib32ncurses5-dev libncurses5 libncurses5-dev
Additionally, for Ubuntu versions older than 20.04 (focal), install also:
libwxgtk3.0-dev
While for Ubuntu versions older than 16.04 (xenial), install:
libwxgtk2.8-dev
Java
Different versions of LineageOS require different JDK (Java Development Kit) versions.
- LineageOS 18.1+: OpenJDK 11 (included in source download)
- LineageOS 16.0-17.1: OpenJDK 1.9 (included in source download)
- LineageOS 14.1-15.1: OpenJDK 1.8 (install
openjdk-8-jdk
)- NOTE: For building these versions you’ll need to remove
TLSv1
andTLSv1.1
fromjdk.tls.disabledAlgorithms
in/etc/java-8-openjdk/security/java.security
.
- NOTE: For building these versions you’ll need to remove
- LineageOS 11.0-13.0: OpenJDK 1.7 (install
openjdk-7-jdk
)*
* Ubuntu 16.04 and newer do not have OpenJDK 1.7 in the standard package repositories. See the Ask Ubuntu question “How do I install openjdk 7 on Ubuntu 16.04 or higher?”. Note that the suggestion to use PPA openjdk-r is outdated (the PPA has never updated their offering of openjdk-7-jdk, so it lacks security fixes); skip that answer even if it is the most upvoted.
Python
Different versions of LineageOS require different default Python versions.
- LineageOS 17.1+: Python 3 (install
python-is-python3
) - LineageOS 11.0-16.0: Python 2 (install
python-is-python2
)
If your default is python3
, but you’re building branch that requires python2
, there are various methods to using it, e.g. symlinking it manually or creating a virtualenv for it.
We recommend the latter:
Generate the virtualenv once using virtualenv --python=python2 ~/.lineage_venv
. Afterwards, activate it in each terminal where you need python2
as default by running ~/.lineage_venv/bin/activate
.
The path ~/.lineage_venv
can be chosen freely, this is just an example!
Create the directories
You’ll need to set up some directories in your build environment.
To create them:
mkdir -p ~/bin
mkdir -p ~/android/lineage
The ~/bin
directory will contain the git-repo tool (commonly named “repo”) and the ~/android/lineage
directory will contain the source code of LineageOS.
Install the repo
command
Enter the following to download the repo
binary and make it executable (runnable):
curl https://storage.googleapis.com/git-repo-downloads/repo > ~/bin/repo
chmod a+x ~/bin/repo
Put the ~/bin
directory in your path of execution
In recent versions of Ubuntu, ~/bin
should already be in your PATH. You can check this by opening ~/.profile
with a text editor and verifying the following code exists (add it if it is missing):
# set PATH so it includes user's private bin if it exists
if [ -d "$HOME/bin" ] ; then
PATH="$HOME/bin:$PATH"
fi
Then, run source ~/.profile
to update your environment.
Configure git
Given that repo
requires you to identify yourself to sync Android, run the following commands to configure your git
identity:
git config --global user.email "you@example.com"
git config --global user.name "Your Name"
Due to their size, some repos are configured for lfs
or Large File Storage
. To make sure your distribution is prepared for this, run:
git lfs install
To avoid duplicated Change-Id:
trailers in commit messages, especially when cherry-picking changes, make Change-Id:
a known trailer to git:
git config --global trailer.changeid.key "Change-Id"
Turn on caching to speed up build
Make use of ccache
if you want to speed up subsequent builds by running:
export USE_CCACHE=1
export CCACHE_EXEC=/usr/bin/ccache
and adding that line to your ~/.bashrc
file. Then, specify the maximum amount of disk space you want ccache
to use by typing this:
ccache -M 50G
where 50G
corresponds to 50GB of cache. This needs to be run once. Anywhere from 25GB-100GB will result in very noticeably increased build speeds
(for instance, a typical 1hr build time can be reduced to 20min). If you’re only building for one device, 25GB-50GB is fine. If you plan to build
for several devices that do not share the same kernel source, aim for 75GB-100GB. This space will be permanently occupied on your drive, so take this
into consideration.
You can also enable the optional ccache
compression. While this may involve a slight performance slowdown, it increases the number of files that fit in the cache. To enable it, run:
ccache -o compression=true
ccache
size can be lower (aim for approximately 20GB for one device).Initialize the LineageOS source repository
The following branches are currently supported for building a UTM virtual machine package:
- lineage-21.0
- lineage-22.0
- lineage-22.1
Enter the following to initialize the repository:
cd ~/android/lineage
repo init -u https://github.com/LineageOS/android.git -b lineage-22.1 --git-lfs --no-clone-bundle
Download the source code
To start the download of the source code to your computer, type the following:
repo sync
The LineageOS manifests include a sensible default configuration for repo, which we strongly suggest you use (i.e. don’t add any options to sync).
For reference, our default values are -j 4
and -c
. The -j 4
part implies be four simultaneous threads/connections. If you experience
problems syncing, you can lower this to -j 3
or -j 2
. On the other hand, -c
makes repo to pull in only the current branch instead of all branches that are available on GitHub.
repo sync
command is used to update the latest source code from LineageOS and Google. Remember it, as you may want to
do it every few days to keep your code base fresh and up-to-date. But note, if you make any changes, running repo sync
may wipe them away!Select the target to build
Please refer to this to help select your target.
ARM (64-bit only)
architecture targets. Other targets will work in UTM virtual machine on Apple Silicon Mac too (in emulation mode instead of virtualization mode), however the performance will be much worse.Start the build
Time to start building!
To build the ZIP archive containing UTM virtual machine package with LineageOS pre-installed:
m vm-utm-zip
If the build completed without errors, the ZIP archive will appear at out/target/product/<target>/VirtualMachine/UTM/UTM-VM-lineage-*-20250317-UNOFFICIAL-<target>.zip
.
Now, transfer the ZIP archive to the Apple Silicon Mac which you wish to run it on.
Install UTM app
Please refer to UTM Documentation.
Install the virtual machine
Locate the ZIP archive UTM-VM-lineage-*-20250317-UNOFFICIAL-<target>.zip
in Finder.
Double-click on it to decompress it.
After the decompression process finishes, the UTM virtual machine package named LineageOS_on_<Architecture>.utm
will appear in the same directory.
Double-click on the package, UTM main window will appear, and the virtual machine will be loaded on UTM with name LineageOS on <Architecture>
.
Set the renderer backend
If the renderer backend ANGLE (Metal)
is used, the Android UI will not appear after Android finishes booting. It is necessary to ensure the renderer backend is always set to ANGLE (OpenGL)
when using this virtual machine.
Click on an empty area of the UTM main window, click UTM
on the menu bar, click Settings
.
On the new window, switch to Display
tab, select ANGLE (OpenGL)
on Renderer Backend
dropdown menu, then close the window.
Disable virtualization mode if necessary
If the target is ARM (64-bit only)
architecture, proceed to the next step.
If not, please open virtual machine settings, switch to QEMU
tab, untoggle Use Hypervisor
, then close the window.
Start the virtual machine
That’s it! The virtual machine is ready to use.
Now, you can start the virtual machine.