Subnautica is an open-world survival/action-adventure game developed and published by Unknown Worlds Entertainment. In the game, the player is free to explore the ocean of an alien world and is encouraged to survive in it. In this guide, we’ll show you how to play Subnautica on Linux.
Subnautica works on Linux, but only with the help of Proton and Steam Play, which is included in the Linux version of Steam. So, before we go over how to install Subnautica on Linux, we will need to get Steam working.
Install Steam
To start the installation of Steam on your Linux PC, you will need to open up a terminal window. To open up a terminal window on Linux, press the Ctrl + Alt + T button on the keyboard, or, search for “terminal” in the app menu.
Once the terminal window is open, the installation can begin. Using the instructions below, get Steam installed on your Linux PC.
Ubuntu
Steam is best installed on Ubuntu using the apt install command below.
sudo apt install steam
Debian
If you’re on Debian Linux, the best way to get it working is by downloading the Steam DEB package to your PC, rather than dealing with the included Debian “Non-free” software repository.
To start the download of Steam to your Debian system, use the wget downloader command below. It will grab the latest release of Steam directly from Valve’s website, and place it into your home folder.
wget https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/client/installer/steam.deb
After downloading the Steam DEB package to your computer, you can begin the installation of Steam on Debian. To install Steam on your system, use the following dpkg command below.
sudo dpkg -i steam.deb
Now that the Steam package is installed on your system, you will need to correct any dependency errors that have appeared during the installation. To correct these issues, make use of the following apt-get install -f command below.
sudo apt-get install -f
Arch Linux
Steam is available to Arch Linux users, but only those who have the “multilib” software repository up and running. To get it working, open up your Pacman.conf file, locate “multilib”, and remove all # symbols.
After removing all of the symbols, save your edits and re-sync Pacman with the command below.
sudo pacman -Syy
Finally, install the latest release of Steam on Arch Linux with the command below.
sudo pacman -S steam
Fedora/OpenSUSE
On both Fedora and OpenSUSE Linux, it is possible to install Steam through the included software repositories. However, the Flatpak release of Steam tends to work better on these operating systems and we suggest using it instead.
Flatpak
To use the Flatpak release of Steam on your Linux PC, you’ll need to first enable the Flatpak runtime. To enable the runtime, follow this guide on the subject. Once the runtime is enabled on your system, use the two commands below to get Steam working.
flatpak remote-add --if-not-exists flathub https://flathub.org/repo/flathub.flatpakrepo
flatpak install flathub com.valvesoftware.Steam
Play Subnautica on Linux
With Steam installed, open it up and log into your account using your user credentials. Then, follow the step-by-step guide below to learn how to set up Subnautica on Linux!
Step 1: To start, find the “Steam” menu and click on it with the mouse. Then, use the menu to select the “Settings” menu. Inside of the settings menu, find the “Steam Play” area, and check both the “Enable Steam Play for supported titles” box and the “Enable Steam Play for all other titles” box.
Click the “OK” button, to apply the settings to Steam.
Step 2: Find the “Store” button, and click on it to access the Steam store. Once inside the Steam store, find the search box, and click on it with the mouse. Then, type in “Subnautica,” and press the Enter key to view the search results.
Look through the search results for “Subnautica” and click on it with the mouse to head over to the Subnautica store page.
Step 3: Find the green “Add to cart” button on the Subnautica Store page to add the game to your Steam store cart. Once it is in your Steam cart, click on the cart icon at the top of the page and purchase Subnautica to add it to your account.
Step 4: After purchasing Subnautica, find the “Library” button, and click on it with the mouse to go to your Steam library. From there, find Subnautica and click on the blue “INSTALL” button to get the game set up on Linux.
When the game is done installing on Linux, the blue “INSTALL” button will become a green “PLAY” button. Select the “PLAY” button to start up the game. Enjoy, and happy gaming!
