How to install Popcorn Time movie player on Ubuntu 20.4 LTS

Steps to easily install the popular Popcorn Time online streaming player on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS Focal Fossa Linux or later version such as Ubuntu 19.04/18.04  for watching various movies and tv shows.

What is the Popcorn Time app?

Porncorn Time is an app for online streaming of movies and TV Show for free using Torrent files. It is an open-source application and available for all major platforms such as Linux, Windows, macOS, and Android. Due to its popularity, various websites using its name to offer apps but the official one is https://popcorntime.app/

So, make sure you visit the above-given link only to download its application for Linux, Windows, and other operating websites.

Requirements to Install PopCorn Time on Linux:

  • non-root sudo user
  • Working internet connection
  • Ubuntu 20.04 LTS/18.04 LTS or other Linux such as Mx Linux, Linux Mint, RedHat, CetOS, Fedora, etc. The command will be the same for all of them.

Step 1: Create a Directory for Popcorn Time app

Well, we can create and run this online streaming app right from Downloads directory, however, to make it safe from accidentally deleting, we are creating a folder in /opt directory.

sudo mkdir /opt/pop

Step 2: Switch to the pop directory

Now, simply switch to the above-created directory to download and save the Popcorn Time Linux app.

cd /opt/pop

Step 3: Download Popcorn Time Linux Archive

The application is available in two versions for the installation on Linux -32-bit, and 63-bit. You can download the one as per your system CPU architecture.

For 32-bit systems

sudo wget https://get.popcorntime.app/build/Popcorn-Time-0.4.4-linux32.zip

For 64-bit systems

sudo wget https://get.popcorntime.app/build/Popcorn-Time-0.4.4-linux64.zip

Step 4: Unzip the archive

Finally, the binaries are on our system, its time to unzip it, so that we run popcorn time on Linux to watch various movies and shows for free. As the file we have downloaded is using .zip extension thus we use unzip command.

In case your system doesn’t have an unzip tool then install it :

For Debian & Ubuntu systems.

sudo apt install unzip

On CentOS or RHEL

sudo yum install unzip

Command to extract the downloaded Popcorn Archive.

Syntax: sudo unzip filename

If you have 32-bit:

sudo unzip Popcorn-Time-*-linux32.zip

For 64-bit

sudo unzip Popcorn-Time-*-linux64.zip

Step 5: Create a Desktop Shortcut

Although we can directly start the Popcorn-Time without Desktop shortcut using the command /opt/pop/./Popcorn-Time

However, to make it easy for everyone to run it without every time going through the command terminal, we should create a Desktop shortcut, and here is the way of doing that.

sudo nano ~/Desktop/Popcorn.desktop
[Desktop Entry]
Version=1.0
Type=Application
Terminal=false
Exec=/opt/pop/Popcorn-Time
Name=PopCorn
Comment=Movie
Icon=/opt/pop/src/app/images/icon.png

Ctrl+X and press Y and then Enter key to save the file.

How to create Desktop shortcut on Ubuntu Linux

Step 6: Make the Desktop shortcut executable

You will see a shortcut on your Desktop. By default, it will not run this streaming application because it is not yet executable. To do that right-click on the created Desktop shortcut and select Properties.

Open Linux Desktop shortcut propterties

Now, go to Permission Tab and mark “Allow executing file as Program”.

Make Ubuntu Linux Desktop shortuct executable

Step 7: Run Popcorn Time

Click on the create a desktop shortcut to start watching online movies and shows on Linux distro.

Create popcorm Time Linux icon

Popcoren Time streaming app installation on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS

Create a keyboard shortcut for popcorn time

If you don’t want to create a Desktop shortcut due to some reason then simply assign a keyboard shortcut to popcorn time to start the application when you want.

  1. Go to Ubuntu Applications.
  2. Search for Settings and open it.
  3. Now, select keyboard settings from the left side options menu.
  4. Scroll down to the end and click on the + icon.
    Keyboard shortcut for popcorn time on ubuntu linux
  5. Give the shortcut a name, for example, Popcorn.
  6. Add the command for the same. Copy-paste this: /opt/pop/Popcorn-Time If you have installed it somewhere else then use that path. However, in case you have followed this tutorial then use the given one.
  7. Now, set the Keyboard shortcut whatever you want. However, just make sure that has not been assigned to some other application or service on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS. Therefore, here we are using SHIFT+ALT+P. You can use the same. To register the shortcut you just need to press and hold the keys on your keyboard one by one.
    create keyboard shortcut popcorn time movie app on Ubuntu 20
  8. Once you are done, Add the keyboard shortcut for popcorn time and close the settings window.
  9. Now, whenever you want to run this online movie and tv show streaming application. Just hit created shortcut and the app will be in front of you.

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