quickemu-project/quickemu

Analysis updated 2026-06-24

★ 15,092ShellAudience · ops devopsComplexity · 3/5Setup · moderate

Mindmap

mindmap
  root((Quickemu))
    Inputs
      OS name and edition
      Generated conf file
    Outputs
      Running QEMU VM
      Disk image on host
    Commands
      quickget downloads ISO
      quickemu starts VM
    Guests supported
      Linux distros
      macOS Mojave to Sequoia
      Windows 10 and 11 with TPM
      BSDs and oddballs
    Features
      SPICE graphics
      File sharing 9p Samba
      SSH and port forward
      EFI and SecureBoot

mindmap root((Quickemu)) Inputs OS name and edition Generated conf file Outputs Running QEMU VM Disk image on host Commands quickget downloads ISO quickemu starts VM Guests supported Linux distros macOS Mojave to Sequoia Windows 10 and 11 with TPM BSDs and oddballs Features SPICE graphics File sharing 9p Samba SSH and port forward EFI and SecureBoot

Click or tap to explore — scroll the page freely

What do people build with it?

USE CASE 1

Spin up a Windows 11 VM on Linux without writing any QEMU command-line flags.

USE CASE 2

Try a new Linux distro from a USB-mounted disk image without touching the host.

USE CASE 3

Run a macOS guest on macOS or Linux to test apps across versions.

USE CASE 4

Boot ARM64 Linux guests on an ARM host like an Apple Silicon Mac.

What is it built with?

BashQEMUSPICEVirtIO

How does it compare?

	quickemu-project/quickemu	bash-it/bash-it	winapps-org/winapps
Stars	15,092	15,044	15,016
Language	Shell	Shell	Shell
Last pushed	—	—	2026-05-16
Maintenance	—	—	Maintained
Setup difficulty	moderate	easy	hard
Complexity	3/5	1/5	4/5
Audience	ops devops	developer	ops devops

Figures from each repo's GitHub metadata at analysis time.

How do you get it running?

Difficulty · moderate Time to first run · 1h+

Needs QEMU and several optional packages (spice, samba, virgl) installed, first VM download can be several gigabytes.

License is not stated in the explanation.

In plain English

Quickemu is a command-line tool that makes it easy to create and run virtual machines on a Linux or macOS host. A virtual machine is a sandboxed computer running inside your computer, useful for trying out other operating systems without touching your real install. Under the hood Quickemu drives QEMU, which is a powerful but notoriously fiddly virtualisation program, and picks sensible defaults so you do not have to configure it by hand. The tool comes as a pair of shell scripts. The first, quickget, downloads the official installation image for the operating system you choose and writes a matching configuration file. The second, quickemu, reads that file, inspects your hardware, and launches the virtual machine with settings tuned to your machine. The README shows a two-line example: quickget nixos unstable minimal to fetch and configure NixOS, then quickemu --vm nixos-unstable-minimal.conf to start it. Running quickget with no arguments prints the list of all supported systems. The README says nearly a thousand operating system editions are supported. This includes Ubuntu and all of its official flavours, many other Linux distributions, macOS versions from Mojave through Sequoia, Windows 10 and 11 (with TPM 2.0 emulation), Windows Server 2016, 2019 and 2022, several BSDs, and curiosities like FreeDOS, Haiku, KolibriOS, OpenIndiana, and ReactOS. ARM64 guests can be run natively on ARM hosts and emulated on x86_64. Feature-wise the tool exposes SPICE for graphical access with host-guest clipboard sharing, several file-sharing methods (VirtIO-webdavd, VirtIO-9p, Samba if smbd is installed), the QEMU Guest Agent, VirGL graphics acceleration, USB and smartcard pass-through, automatic SSH and arbitrary network port forwarding, full-duplex audio, braille support, and a choice of EFI (with or without SecureBoot) or Legacy BIOS boot. Virtual machines and their configuration can live anywhere, including external USB storage, and no elevated permissions are needed to run them. The project ships a wiki with installation instructions and separate guides for creating Linux, macOS, and Windows virtual machines, along with advanced configuration topics and a list of alternative front-ends, including the related Quickgui desktop application.

Copy-paste prompts

Prompt 1

Install quickemu on Ubuntu 24.04 and walk me through creating a Windows 11 VM with TPM 2.0 and SecureBoot.

Prompt 2

Use quickget to set up the latest Fedora Workstation VM, then start it with VirGL acceleration and 8 GB of RAM.

Prompt 3

Show me the quickemu config flags to share a host folder into a Linux guest using VirtIO-9p.

Prompt 4

Compare quickemu vs UTM vs virt-manager for running macOS Sonoma as a VM on a Linux laptop.

Prompt 5

Write a wrapper script that runs quickget for the five OSes I name, stores them under /mnt/vms, and launches the one I pick from a fzf menu.

Frequently asked questions

What is quickemu?

Quickemu is a shell-script wrapper around QEMU that downloads OS install images and runs almost a thousand operating systems as virtual machines on Linux or macOS with sensible defaults.

What language is quickemu written in?

Mainly Shell. The stack also includes Bash, QEMU, SPICE.

What license does quickemu use?

License is not stated in the explanation.

How hard is quickemu to set up?

Setup difficulty is rated moderate, with roughly 1h+ to a first successful run.

Who is quickemu for?

Mainly ops devops.

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