How to install the latest stable Kdenlive on Fedora or Ubuntu

Technology

Kdenlive is an acronym for KDE Non-Linear Video Editor and it is primarily aimed at the GNU/Linux platform but also works on BSD. It is based on the MLT framework and accepts many audio and video formats, allows you to add effects, transitions and render into the format of your choice. You can easily install it on Fedora or Ubuntu Linux through the official or unofficial repositories.

The latest Kdenlive as Appimage for Linux systems
The latest Kdenlive as Appimage for Linux systems

Kdenlive. A much more powerful video editor

Non-linear video editing is much more powerful than linear editors, hence it requires a bit more organization before starting. However, it is not reserved for specialists and can be used for small personal projects. Kdenlive, in particular, integrates many plugin effects for video and sound processing or creation.

Kdenlive packages are provided by most of the popular distributions, like Archlinux, Debian, Fedora, OpenSUSE and Ubuntu. Unfortunately, the package version provided in official repository or in unofficial repositories (like PPA and RPMs) isn’t always the last update.

No matter, several cross-distro packaging formats provide an easy one-click install system for GNU/Linux distribution: the Appimage format. Quite less heavy then a Snap or a FlatPak (around 200MB versus 400/500MB) and fast as hell.

To install the latest Kdenlive Appimage version, first, download it from https://files.kde.org/kdenlive/release/.

Then make it executable with chmod +x in a terminal:

$ sudo chmod +x /home/<username>/Downloads/kdenlive-<downloaded-version>-x86_64.appimage

Move it to the /opt directory:

$ sudo mkdir /opt/kdenlive

$ sudo mv /home/<username>/Downloads/kdenlive-<downloaded-version>-x86_64.appimage /opt/kdenlive/

Download a Kdenlive icon from here:

kdenlive PNG icon
Kdenlive PNG icon

Move the icon to the Kdenlive folder:

$ sudo mv /home/<username>/Downloads/kdenlive.png /opt/kdenlive/kdenlive.png

Create an application launcher for Kdenlive Appimage:

$ vi /home/<username>/.local/share/applications/kdenlive.desktop

And populate the file with:

[Desktop Entry]
Type=Application
Name=Kdenlive
GenericName=Video editor
Comment=KDE Video editor
Categories=Utility;Video;Editor;
Exec=/opt/kdenlive/kdenlive-<downloaded-version>-x86_64.appimage
Icon=/opt/kdenlive/kdenlive.png
Name[en_US]=Kdenlive

And you’re done.

Launch your latest Kdenlive as any other application.