Install Cursor AI Code Editor on Ubuntu

Go to https://www.cursor.com/
Click “Download for Free“
Save the AppImage file in Downloads which could be named as “cursor-0.42.3x86_64.AppImage“
Open terminal in Downloads

Make the AppImage executable

 $ chmod +x cursor-0.42.3x86_64.AppImage

Try running AppImage temporarily from the terminal to check if there is any issue
```
 $ ./cursor-0.42.3x86_64.AppImage
```
If the Cursor AI Code Editor opens without any error or issue then we are good to go but if there are any issues like I faced in Ubuntu 24.04 LTS is:
```
 dlopen(): error loading libfuse.so.2

 AppImages require FUSE to run. 
 You might still be able to extract the contents of this AppImage 
 if you run it with the --appimage-extract option. 
 See https://github.com/AppImage/AppImageKit/wiki/FUSE 
 for more information
```
Then install the libfuse2 library like this:
```
 $ sudo apt update
 $ sudo apt install libfuse2
```
After installing the libfuse2 rerun the AppImage file like this:
```
 $ ./cursor-0.42.3x86_64.AppImage
```
If the Code Editor opens without any error, we can proceed to the next step.
Now, extract the contents of the AppImage
```
 $ ./cursor-0.42.3x86_64.AppImage --appimage-extract
```
This will create a new directory squashfs-root in the same location where the AppImage is located i.e. in the Downloads folder itself.
Now move the AppImage and Cursor AI icon to a different stable location ~/.local/bin and we’ll create a folder inside this directory as cursor.
```
 $ mkdir ~/.local/bin/cursor
 $ mv cursor-0.42.3x86_64.AppImage ~/.local/bin/cursor
 $ mv squashfs-root/cursor.png ~/.local/bin/cursor
```

Now let’s edit the desktop launcher

 $ gedit squashfs-root/cursor.desktop

Replace the existing file content with the below content and don’t forget to replace the username with your username of ubuntu which is visible in the terminal every time

 [Desktop Entry]
 Name=Cursor
 Exec=/home/username/.local/bin/cursor/cursor-0.42.3x86_64.AppImage %U
 Terminal=false
 Type=Application
 Icon=/home/username/.local/bin/cursor/cursor.png
 StartupWMClass=Cursor
 X-AppImage-Version=241016kxu9umuir
 Comment=Cursor is an AI-first coding environment.
 MimeType=x-scheme-handler/cursor;
 Categories=Utility;

Save the file and close the gedit editor.

Now it’s time to move the desktop launcher from squashfs-root to ~/.local/share/applications to make it visible in Applications:
```
$ mv squashfs-root/cursor.desktop ~/.local/share/applications
```

Give the cursor.desktop file executable permissions:

$ chmod +x ~/.local/share/applications/cursor.desktop

Now remove the squashfs-root directory from Downloads
```
$ rm -rf squashfs-root
```
NOTE: Keep in mind that almost every command is run from Downloads folder/directory.

Now go build some great AI projects in Cursor AI. Happy Coding!

How to Install and Setup Cursor AI Code Editor on Ubuntu

Learn to install and set up Cursor AI Code Editor on Ubuntu with this step-by-step guide. Perfect for developing AI projects