Instructions for building from source and distro packagers. We highly recommend distro packagers read through this page fully.
Quickshell has a set of base dependencies you will always need, names vary by distro:
cmake
qt6base
qt6declarative
pkg-config
cli11
We recommend an implicit dependency on qt6svg
. If it is not installed, svg images and
svg icons will not work, including system ones.
At least Qt 6.6 is required.
All features are enabled by default and some have their own dependencies.
If your package manager supports enabling some features but not others,
we recommend not exposing the subfeatures and just the main ones that introduce
new dependencies: wayland
, x11
, pipewire
, hyprland
We recommend leaving Jemalloc enabled as it will mask memory fragmentation caused by the QML engine, which results in much lower memory usage. Without this you will get a perceived memory leak.
To disable: -DUSE_JEMALLOC=OFF
Dependencies: jemalloc
This feature allows interaction with unix sockets and creating socket servers which is useful for IPC and has no additional dependencies.
WARNING: Disabling unix sockets will NOT make it safe to run arbitrary code using quickshell. There are many vectors which mallicious code can use to escape into your system.
To disable: -DSOCKETS=OFF
This feature enables wayland support. Subfeatures exist for each particular wayland integration.
WARNING: Wayland integration relies on features that are not part of the public Qt API and which may break in minor releases. Updating quickshell's dependencies without ensuring without ensuring that the current Qt version is supported WILL result in quickshell failing to build or misbehaving at runtime.
Currently supported Qt versions: 6.6
, 6.7
.
To disable: -DWAYLAND=OFF
Dependencies:
qt6wayland
wayland
(libwayland-client)wayland-scanner
(may be part of your distro's wayland package)wayland-protocols
Enables wlroots layershell integration through the zwlr-layer-shell-v1 protocol, enabling use cases such as bars overlays and backgrounds. This feature has no extra dependencies.
To disable: -DWAYLAND_WLR_LAYERSHELL=OFF
Enables session lock support through the ext-session-lock-v1 protocol, which allows quickshell to be used as a session lock under compatible wayland compositors.
To disable: -DWAYLAND_SESSION_LOCK=OFF
Enables management of windows of other clients through the zwlr-foreign-toplevel-management-v1 protocol, which allows quickshell to be used as a session lock under compatible wayland compositors.
To disable: -DWAYLAND_TOPLEVEL_MANAGEMENT=OFF
This feature enables x11 support. Currently this implements panel windows for X11 similarly to the wlroots layershell above.
To disable: -DX11=OFF
Dependencies: libxcb
This features enables viewing and management of pipewire nodes.
To disable: -DSERVICE_PIPEWIRE=OFF
Dependencies: libpipewire
This feature enables system tray support using the status notifier dbus protocol.
To disable: -DSERVICE_STATUS_NOTIFIER=OFF
Dependencies: qt6dbus
(usually part of qt6base)
This feature enables access to MPRIS compatible media players using its dbus protocol.
To disable: -DSERVICE_MPRIS=OFF
Dependencies: qt6dbus
(usually part of qt6base)
This feature enables PAM integration for user authentication.
To disable: -DSERVICE_PAM=OFF
Dependencies: pam
This feature enables hyprland specific integrations. It requires wayland support but has no extra dependencies.
To disable: -DHYPRLAND=OFF
Enables creation of global shortcuts under hyprland through the hyprland-global-shortcuts-v1 protocol. Generally a much nicer alternative to using unix sockets to implement the same thing. This feature has no extra dependencies.
To disable: -DHYPRLAND_GLOBAL_SHORTCUTS=OFF
Enables windows to grab focus similarly to a context menu undr hyprland through the hyprland-focus-grab-v1 protocol. This feature has no extra dependencies.
To disable: -DHYPRLAND_FOCUS_GRAB=OFF
For developers and prospective contributors: See CONTRIBUTING.md.
We highly recommend using ninja
to run the build, but you can use makefiles if you must.
$ cmake -GNinja -B build -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=RelWithDebInfo [additional disable flags from above here]
Note that features you do not supply dependencies for MUST be disabled with their associated flags or quickshell will fail to build.
Additionally, note that clang builds much faster than gcc if you care.
You may disable debug information but it's only a couple megabytes and is extremely helpful for helping us fix problems when they do arise.
$ cmake --build build
$ cmake --install build