Install on Linux

For 64-bit (x86_64) Linux with glibc 2.35 or newer, on X11 or Wayland: GNOME, KDE Plasma, Hyprland, Sway and others.

Beta

Kudu for Linux is new. If something doesn't work on your setup, please open an issue with your distribution, desktop and ~/.local/share/kudu/kudu.log.

The quick way (any distribution)

Terminalcurl -fsSL https://github.com/manasdutta04/kudu/releases/latest/download/install.sh | sh

It installs Kudu for your user (~/.local/bin/kudu and your app menu) and asks for sudo once to set up keyboard access (see below). Log out and back in after the first install.

Packages

Ubuntu, Debian, Linux Mint, Pop!_OS

Download Kudu-Linux-x86_64.deb, then:

Terminalsudo apt install ./Kudu-Linux-x86_64.deb

Fedora, RHEL, openSUSE

Download Kudu-Linux-x86_64.rpm, then:

Fedorasudo dnf install ./Kudu-Linux-x86_64.rpm

openSUSEsudo zypper install ./Kudu-Linux-x86_64.rpm

Arch, Manjaro, NixOS and everything else

Use the install script above, or download Kudu-Linux-x86_64.tar.gz and run ./kudu/kudu. It needs ALSA, OpenSSL 3 and OpenMP, which most systems already have:

Archsudo pacman -S --needed alsa-lib openssl gcc-libs

Allow keyboard access (once)

So that its shortcut works everywhere, on X11 and every Wayland compositor, Kudu reads the keyboard through /dev/input and types through a virtual keyboard (/dev/uinput). The install script does all of this. The .deb and .rpm packages install the virtual-keyboard rule, but adding you to the input group is up to you (Kudu's window shows the command if it's missing). By hand:

Add yourself to the input group
sudo usermod -aG input $USER
Allow the virtual keyboard
echo 'KERNEL=="uinput", GROUP="input", MODE="0660", OPTIONS+="static_node=uinput"' | sudo tee /etc/udev/rules.d/70-kudu-uinput.rules
sudo modprobe uinput && sudo udevadm control --reload-rules && sudo udevadm trigger
Log out and back in
Group changes take effect on the next login. Then start Kudu from your app menu.

Kudu only uses this access to notice its own shortcut and to type what you dictated. Key presses are never recorded or stored.

Desktop notes

Shortcut: hold Ctrl + Super to dictate. Modifier-only shortcuts work best on Linux, because a shortcut with a letter key also reaches the app you're in.
Tray icon: works on KDE Plasma and most desktops; on GNOME install the AppIndicator and KStatusNotifierItem Support extension.
Overlay pill: uses layer-shell on KDE, Hyprland and Sway, and XWayland on GNOME.
Terminals: Kudu pastes with Ctrl + Shift + V in terminals, Ctrl + V elsewhere.
Clipboard on GNOME Wayland: if pasting fails, install wl-clipboard.

Uninstalling

Package: sudo apt remove kudu or sudo dnf remove kudu. Script: rm ~/.local/bin/kudu ~/.local/share/applications/kudu.desktop. Your data lives in ~/.config/kudu and ~/.local/share/kudu.

Having trouble? See Troubleshooting.

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