Ubuntu 24: Install VirtualBox Guest Additions (Full Installation Tutorial)

In this tutorial, I’ll show you how to install VirtualBox Guest Additions on Ubuntu 24.

VirtualBox Guest Additions is a must-have for improving the performance of your Ubuntu virtual machine. It also enables features like seamless mouse integration, shared clipboard, shared folders, better display resolution, and more.

Step 1: Install Required Packages

First, we need to install some essential packages that are required for building kernel modules:

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

These packages include the GCC compiler, kernel headers, and DKMS (Dynamic Kernel Module Support), which are necessary for VirtualBox Guest Additions to work properly on Ubuntu VM.

Step 2: Insert the VirtualBox Guest Additions CD Image

After installing the dependencies, go to the Device menu and select Insert Guest Additions CD Image.

Step 3: Mount the CD Image to the /mnt Directory

Next, mount the CD image to the /mnt folder using the mount command:

sudo mount /dev/cdrom /mnt

Step 4: Run the Installation Script

Next step is to install guest additions. First navigate to the /mnt directory and then execute the VBoxLinuxAdditions.run file.

cd /mnt/
sudo ./VBoxLinuxAdditions.run

Step 5: Reboot the Ubuntu VM

Once the installation is complete, we need to reboot the virtual machine to apply the changes.

After the reboot, the virtual machine should have all the features of VirtualBox Guest Additions enabled, like better display resolution, shared clipboard, and shared folders.