Prerequisites

  • Ubuntu 24.04 LTS (Noble) on a T2 MacBook
  • LTS kernel installed (linux-t2-lts)
  • Kernel: 6.18.25-1-t2-noble

1. Remove the old Ubuntu VirtualBox

Ubuntu’s repo ships VirtualBox 7.0.16 which doesn’t compile against kernel 6.18+. Remove it first:

❯ sudo apt remove virtualbox virtualbox-dkms virtualbox-qt

2. Add Oracle’s VirtualBox repository

Install required tools:

❯ sudo apt install curl ca-certificates gpg lsb-release

Import Oracle’s signing key:


curl -fsSL https://www.virtualbox.org/download/oracle_vbox_2016.asc | sudo gpg --dearmor --yes -o /usr/share/keyrings/oracle-virtualbox-2016.gpg

Add the repository using the new Ubuntu 24.04 .sources format:


export UBUNTU_CODENAME="noble"
cat <<EOF | ❯ sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/oracle-virtualbox.sources
Types: deb
URIs: https://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/debian
Suites: $UBUNTU_CODENAME
Components: contrib
Architectures: amd64
Signed-By: /usr/share/keyrings/oracle-virtualbox-2016.gpg
EOF

3. Install VirtualBox 7.2

❯ sudo apt update
❯ sudo apt install virtualbox-7.2 build-essential dkms linux-headers-$(uname -r)

Verify the service is running:

systemctl status vboxdrv

4. Add your user to the vboxusers group

❯ sudo usermod -aG vboxusers "$USER"

5. Install the Extension Pack

The Extension Pack adds USB 2.0/3.0 support, RDP, disk encryption, etc.

VBOX_VERSION=$(VBoxManage -v | sed -E 's/[_r].*$//')
echo "$VBOX_VERSION"

cd ~/Downloads
curl -fLO "https://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/${VBOX_VERSION}/Oracle_VirtualBox_Extension_Pack-${VBOX_VERSION}.vbox-extpack"

❯ sudo VBoxManage extpack install --replace "Oracle_VirtualBox_Extension_Pack-${VBOX_VERSION}.vbox-extpack"

Verify:

VBoxManage list extpacks

6. Reboot and launch

❯ sudo reboot

After reboot:

virtualbox

Reference