No Linux support yet?

Just came back after a one year break and still find myself forced to an OS I do not use actively.
I would be really great if you at ZWIFT could/would support Linux as OS!

Luckily I still have an “oldish” Windows machine so I can use if for now …

Hoping for many supporters on this topic!

Enjoy riding!

Andreas

Last I heard Zwift has no plans for Linux support (search the old forums for the threads on it).

It boils down to their user base.

Every platform they support has R&D costs and a complete duplication of QA effort … so to support Linux they would have a very large expense. Considering the percentage of their user base that uses Linux (I’m guessing less than 1%), it just isn’t cost effective.

Have you tried running Zwift in WINE?

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But their user base boils down to what they support. Take Android, for example. You could say their Android user base is close to zero, but that’s because they are only just in beta for support.

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What I meant is what portion of their user base uses Linux AT ALL … LOTS of their customers use Android, but a small fraction of their user base uses Linux.

It makes business sense to invest in an Android client, as lots of their customers will be able to use it. It doesn’t make sense to invest in a Linux client because very few of their customers will be able to use it.

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OK, potential user base. I get that. It’s a pretty small number, and this is where a proprietary engine has a big impact on the equation I expect. With a different one, like Unity perhaps, compiling for a Linux system might not be so big a deal. (Disclaimer: I’ve no idea how good Unity support for Linux actually is, just postulating.)

As a professional software developer, I can assure you that the R&D costs are trivial compared to the QA efforts.

Zwift currently supports 4 major platforms (Mac, PC, iOS, & Android). Each of those platforms has multiple variations (Win 7, 8, 10, IOS 8-12 + ATV, etc).

Adding a new platform is gong to be a major undertaking, especially since Linux has so many variations (distro, hardware, modifications, etc).

Trying to test & support all those variations is going to cost a lot of money.

Even IBM (who, I just read, is buying Redhat) only supports a small subset of Linux distros on some of its enterprise applications (which is the space I work in).

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Heheh, you don’t need to tell me about QA or testing varied platforms. More than 30 years in this game now. I moved away from desktop and embedded programming, but even Web stuff is bad enough. /o\

But in theory that’s one benefit of building on top of a platform like Unity, isn’t it? The platform acts as an interface/buffer and you just use the API to code stuff up. The platform’s mainly responsible for driver and peripheral support, not the stuff built on top of it. Same with stuff like OpenGL or DirectX.

I do think a platform like that – assuming it supported ANT+ for example – would be easier to develop for and test, compared to a bespoke in-house one. Certainly in my current world, using third-party frameworks and other open-source components takes a lot of the headaches away from me, and I don’t have to keep reinventing wheels.

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I get your point … but there’s still underlying native code that has to be verified on every platform.

In the end, it’s a matter of where Zwift wants to focus their efforts … new features, functionality, and bug fixes, for 99% of their user base or adding a new client platform for 1% of their user base.

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Oh yeah. I’m not expecting them to change tack and re-implement Zwift in Unity now. That was a technology choice to be made 5 or more years ago. In the early days after those initial discussions with Eric or venture capitalists, that would have been the time for Jon to say “OK, my engine has been great up to now, but let’s do this in something else now we have the funding for it.”

Maybe. Certainly it’s probably far too late in the game to change things now. I’m more discussing what might have been a better approach with the benefit of hindsight. Maybe easier to support more platforms. Maybe easier to develop mapping tools or other systems. Maybe easier to support better graphics. Maybe easier to support more jerseys in games.

Maybe we’d even have pedals! :smiley:

It’s all hypothetical and they are where they are, for better or worse.

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+1 for the linux support :heart_eyes:

Perhaps with the latest new round of funding a team could be setup to support? I’d postulate that it’s a solid slice of market pie. Sure it’s not enormous being a subset of the 2% but if you think about it many engineers also are cyclists, they can afford the gear, they are early adopters, and many of them are influencers. :grin:

Update… I read Mayfield’s reply here: https://forums.zwift.com/t/linux-support/5829/32. Those numbers he mentioned do look really dire. Oh well, I do appreciate the transparency & details. Loving the product!

Ride on.

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Hello,
since they have an Android app and Android is a (tweaked) Linux, you should be able to install and run Zwift in the Anbox or a similar application on Linux (simple google android apps on Linux). At least in principle. It is actually not an emulation so it should (potentially) run more or less as fast as on any Android device.
When my powermeter and cyclo trainer arrives, I will try and I will let you know what works (if anything works at all). That is sometimes in May when I have time to check it.

Could you please let me know if you’ve succeeded in your tests?
I’m using Linux Mint 19.1 usually as my main OS, and presently using second OS Win10 only for Zwift… So it would be really cool to have this option to run directly inside Mint

Hello Adam,
bad news. The Android version is ARM architecture specific, Genymotion and Anbox cannot run it, I wasn’t able to run it in Virtualbox either, it even doesn’t show as installable in my ChromeOS which has a native support for googleplay android apps and games, same problem I guess). It is possible to run ARM apps in linux android emulators etc., but that takes too much effort and the app would not be stable in the end.
Zwift, you don’t need to officially support Linux, Chromebooks etc., just don’t stand in the way, make your app portable friendly, e.g. release the android version on google play for x_86 chipsets as well. The community will take care of the rest - as it does with so many other apps. (I am not even talking about getting someone to make Zwift run in Wine and port the installation to winetricks).

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there has been a little bit of movement on wine recently:

wine thread:
https://forum.winehq.org/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=31589

wine bug (currently a blocker for zwift on wine):
https://bugs.winehq.org/show_bug.cgi?id=46313

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Thanks. Hopefully, some pasionate cyclists will get it running in Wine :-).

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Looking forward to a linux version. I’m developer and I really don’t want to buy a dedicated Windows pc in order to get Zwift running… I hope there will be one day I can use Zwift on my linux desktop/laptops.
Thanks!

dual boot Windows on a Linux pc you already own?

Thanks for the idea, but as a die-hard linux adept I don’t want run Windows on my hardware :slight_smile: Most probably I’m only kidding myself, however the day there will be native linux support I’ll pay for Zwift subscription immediately.

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Linux support request +1

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