Skype is a very popular proprietary software that allows us to make calls to the other parties over network or internet connection. In general, Skype uses peer-to-peer topology to match calls. Skype is mainly designed for Windows operating systems but recently it can be used in different Linux distributions like Ubuntu, Debian, Mint, Fedora etc. In this tutorial, we will learn how to install, update, upgrade and remove these distributions.

Install Deb Based Distributions Ubuntu, Debian, Mint, Kali

First, we need to download the Skype Deb packages for installation. We will use the following URL which is officially provided by Skype.

https://www.skype.com/en/get-skype/download-skype-for-desktop/

This will download a file named skypeforlinux-64.deb. We can understand that this installation file is designed for 64-bit deb based distributions. Alternatively, we can download Skype package from the following URL directly.

https://repo.skype.com/latest/skypeforlinux-64.deb

Download Skype with wget

We can also use wget  command in order to download Skype from the command line like bash shell.

$ wget https://repo.skype.com/latest/skypeforlinux-64.deb

Install with dpkg Command

Then we will run the installation file with the dpkg command. As package installation is a privileged task we need to provide root privileges with the sudo command by providing the current user password like below.

$ sudo dpkg -i skypeforlinux-64.deb

Start Skype

Skype is installed with the name skypeforlinux so we can start Skype with the following command.

$ skypeforlinux

Install Rpm Based Distributions Fedora, CentOS

We need to download the RPM installation file for the RPM-based distributions like Gedora, CentOS, RedHat etc. We can download the skypeforlinux-64.rpm package from the following like with wgetcommand.

$ wget https://repo.skype.com/latest/skypeforlinux-64.rpm

If we are using 64-bit system we need to also install the following packages.

sudo yum -y install libXv.i686 libXScrnSaver.i686 qt.i686 qt-x11.i686 pulseaudio-libs.i686 pulseaudio-libs-glib2.i686 alsa-plugins-pulseaudio.i686

Install Skype Package

Now we can install the skypeforlinux-64.rpm package with the following command.

$ sudo rpm -i skypeforlinux-64.rpm

Install All Linux Distributions Ubuntu, Debian, Mint, Kali, Fedora, CentOS with Snap

Snap is a container technology which helps developers and users to solve dependency and compatibility problems. Snap provides given software with all of its required files and executables by isolating from the current operating system or distributions. We can install Skype Snap on any operating system which can run Snap’s.

Install Snap

First, we will install the Snap if it is not installed currently.

Ubuntu, Debian, Mint, Kali

We will use apt command to install snapd package like below.

$ sudo apt install snapd

Fedora, CentOS, RedHat

We can install Snap with the following command in Fedora, CentOS, RedHat.

$ sudo dnf install snap

Install Skype Snap

Now we have installed Snap for our current Linux distribution. We will install Skype Snap for all Linux distributions with the following command.

$ sudo snap install skype --classic

Run Skype Snap

After installation, the skype command can be used in order to run Skype from Snap like below.

$ skype