Do you want to make Ubuntu look like Mac OS X? If so, we’re going to show you how to do it, step-by-step.
Ubuntu is a full-featured Linux operating system which is based on Debian distribution and freely available with both community and professional support, it comes with Unity as its default desktop environment. There are other flavors of Ubuntu available with other desktops as default like Ubuntu Gnome, Lubuntu, Xubuntu, and so on. A tightly-integrated selection of excellent applications is. Pick the Right Desktop Environment. To achieve the most Mac-like look on Linux you.
The whole point of using Linux is that you can do things like this
It doesn’t matter whether you have a bad case of Apple envy, or you simply appreciate the design aesthetic of Apple’s OS; there’s nothing wrong with aping the appearance of a rival operating system.
After all, the whole point of using Linux is that you are free to do things like this — and hey: you certainly can’t make macOS look like Ubuntu!
How To Make Ubuntu Look like a Mac
A stack of mac GTK themes, icon sets, fonts and cursors are available for Linux, just a quick Google away.
The ones included below are the ones we use/think give you the best Mac-like look on your Linux box, But don’t be afraid to explore DeviantArt, GitHub and other avenues if our choices don’t quite match with your tastes.
1. Pick the Right Desktop Environment
GNOME Shell
To achieve the most Mac-like look on Linux you need to use the most appropriate desktop environment and that is GNOME Shell.
This is not a slight against other desktop environments (DEs) as Unity, Budgie, MATE and Cinnamon can all be moulded to resemble Cupertino’s computing OS too.
But GNOME Shell is the most customisable desktop environment. This is a key ask in a task like this. GNOME Shell lets you theme and re-arrange everything you need to with the least amount hackery or fuss.
If you’re using Ubuntu 18.04 LTS or later you already have everything you need to get started, so skip ahead.
But if you don’t have GNOME Shell installed on Ubuntu you will need to install it first.
This is easy. Just click the button below and follow in the on-screen prompts (select ‘lightdm’ as the display manager when asked):
You’re also going to need to the GNOME Tweaks tool in a few steps time, so install that now too:
Once both installations are complete you need to logout and select the ‘GNOME Shell’ session from the Unity Greeter:
A word on using Unity
One thing GNOME Shell can’t offer, that the Unity desktop can, is global menu support.
Now, I don’t consider this to be a negative as more and more applications use use Client Side Decorations, making the need for a global menu redundant.
But if having an omnipresent set of app menus stripped across the top of the screen is part of the Mac experience you don’t wish to lose, stick with Unity.
2. Install a Mac GTK Theme
The single easiest way to make Ubuntu look like a Mac is to install a Mac GTK theme.
Our top recommendation is the ‘macOS Mojave’ theme by Vinceluice. This is a near-enough pixel-perfect clone of Apple’s OS skin, and is available in light and dark versions. It’s one of the best designed Mac GTK themes out there (it also has a matching GNOME Shell theme).
The ‘macOS Mojave’ theme requires GNOME 3.20 or later, so you’ll need to be running Ubuntu 16.10 or later to use it.
If you’re running the older Ubuntu 16.04 LTS release you can use the competent ‘macOS Sierra’ clone created by the B00merang project:
Tip: How To Install GTK Themes
Once you download your chosen macOS theme from the link(s) above, you will need to install it.
To install themes in Ubuntu first extract the contents of the archive you downloaded, then move the folder inside to the
~/.themes
folder in your Home directory.If you do not see this folder press
Ctrl + H
to reveal hidden folders. Next, find the .themes folder or create it if it doesn’t exist. Move the extract folder mentioned above to this folder.Finally, to change theme, open
GNOME Tweak Tool > Appearance
and select your chosen theme (and the GNOME Shell theme, if you also downloaded one).3. Install a Mac Icon Set
Next grab some a Mac Icon set for Linux. A quick Google will throw up a bunch of results. Most, sadly, aren’t complete enough to function as a full icon set, so you’ll also want to use (and in some cases manually specify) a fall back icon theme like Faba, or Papirus.
To avoid all of that hassle you may wish to use the fabulous ‘La Capitaine‘ icon pack.
What’s great about La Capitaine is that it’s a proper Linux icon set, with custom macOS inspired icons for many Linux apps and not just a direct port of mac icons to Linux. It’s also totally open-source, and is available to download from Github.
How to Install Icon Themes
Once you’ve downloaded your chosen theme from the link(s) above you need to install it. To do this first extract the contents of the archive you download, then move the folder inside to the
~/.icons
folder in your Home directory.If you don’t see this folder press
Ctrl + H
to view hidden folders. Next, find the .icons folder or create it if it doesn’t exist. Move the extract folder mentioned above to this folder.Finally, to apply, open
GNOME Tweak Tool > Appearance
and select your chosen theme.4. Change the System Font
If you’ve used Mac OS X / macOS at some point in the past few years you’ll know it has clean, crisp system typography.
‘Lucida Grande’ is the familiar Mac system font, though Apple uses a system font called ‘San Franciso’ in recent releases of macOS.
A quick Google should turn up plenty more information (and links to download San Francisco font) but be aware that neither font is not licensed for distribution — so we can’t link you to it, sorry!
Thankfully there’s an open-source alternative to ‘Lucida Grande’ called Garuda. It’s even pre-installed out of the box on Ubuntu, so you don’t need to go on a font safari to find it.
Head to
GNOME Tweak Tool > Fonts
and set the ‘Windows Titles’ and ‘Interface’ fonts to Garuda Regular (or any other font you wish).If you use Unity you can use Unity Tweak Tool to change the font on Ubuntu.
5. Add a Desktop Dock
Ask people what a Mac desktop looks like and chances are they will mention its ubiqutious desktop dock. This is a combined application launcher and window switcher.
If you opted to use GNOME Shell back in Step 1 install the excellent Dash to Dock extension from the GNOME extensions site. This dock can be adjusted, tweaked and tune to look exactly like its macOS counterpart.
Dash to Dock doesn’t look very mac-ish by default so you will want to dive in to the
GNOME Tweak Tool > Extensions > Dash to Dock > Appearance
to change the colour to white, and lower the opacity.Plank Dock
If you chose to stick with the Unity desktop you can set the Unity Launcher to hide (
System Settings > Desktop > Behaviour
) and install Plank, a desktop dock, to handle app launching and window switching:Plank can be configured with all sorts of themes too, making it easy to replicate the Mac OS X experience. Gnosemite is a faithful mac Plank theme worth a look.
That’s it; we’ve achieved our aim to make Ubuntu look like a Mac — now it’s your turn.
We’d love to see a screenshot of your mac-inspired creation so do feel free to share one in the comments.
Just like humans that can’t live without soul, computers are also in need of an operating system which makes their living. Unlike humans that they can’t change their souls, but computers can, but what better than adding a soul in it. From this, I mean of their operating system like if you are running Windows on your PC and you have used it for a while and you’re bored of that, you can easily install a new operating system in it via virtual machine like Ubuntu. So here’s how to install Ubuntu on VMware and install Ubuntu on VirtualBox and Install Ubuntu on VMware VirtualBox on Windows.
As Ubuntu is becoming more popular and widely spread, it has surpassed 20 million users actively installed Ubuntu and even might be suggesting others also to use Ubuntu. So, first of all, let’s see what is Ubuntu and why its one of the most popular operating systems than we will show you how to install Ubuntu on VMware and how to install Ubuntu on Virtualbox.
- Related:Install macOS High Sierra on VMware on Windows PC
Ubuntu is an operating system which is based on the open-source and free Linux distribution network. Ubuntu releases a new version of their software every six months with long term support (LTS) release every two years and because of its continuous updates, it has become one of the most popular operating systems and might tackle down Windows and macOS in a few next decade. The good thing is, Ubuntu is, it is available in three versions of core, server, and desktop, which is a Debian-based operating system.
What is VMware?
Whether you’re on Mac or Windows, a virtual machine is what you’ve probably heard of. There are couple of virtual machine apps. Out of those, there are two ✌ most working and powerful one. One of them is VMware, which has two kinds, probably a free and a paid one. The paid one which is VMware Workstation is definitely for business and more powerful use and the free one which VMware Player is definitely for personal use that will also work professionally. So there’s no difference in their work.
What is VirtualBox?
Ubuntu Vmware Mac Os
Virtualbox is a free open-source hosted hypervisor for x89 virtualization, which is developed by oracle corporation. As it’s one of top virtual machine app that will allow you to run multiple operating systems simultaneously or in other words, it allows you to run one operating system inside of another operating system. While it requires at least 4GBs of memory and more than 50GB space, but the more the better it will perform. Like with the 4GB’s of memory and 50GBs of storage, you can run a virtual machine which will work fine but for better performance and better results, having more resources will work better than usual.
Install Ubuntu on VMware & VirtualBox
Installing Ubuntu is probably easy and would take a few time like installing Kali Linux on VMware & VirtualBox. Whether you’re on a Windows or a Mac, we’ll do it completely done. There are a few ways you can install Ubuntu. The first option is to do a clean installation of Ubuntu instead of your actual operating system whether its Windows or Mac. The second option is to install Ubuntu beside Windows or Mac which will be dual-boot that isn’t really cool idea. Last but not least option is to install Ubuntu inside your actual operating system which would be installing Ubuntu on virtual machine or better say install Ubuntu on VMware or install Ubuntu on VirtualBox. This is a safe and interesting idea. So let’s start it.
- Related:Install Kali Linux on VMware & VirtualBox
Step One – Download Ubuntu ISO Image
To install Ubuntu on VMware VirtualBox on Windows, you’ll need to download Ubuntu ISO. Downloading it is pretty easy and it isn’t large too. The Ubuntu 19 is supported for maximum of 9 months while the Ubuntu 18.04 is supported until April 2023 but it’s only available for download in 64-bit.
Step Two – Install VMware or VirtualBox
Whether you’re installing on Mac or Windows, the installation process is nearly the same except a few minor changes and interface. Wherever you’re, installing Ubuntu works from this method. In other words, you can use these steps to install Ubuntu on Mac, install Ubuntu on Windows. The similarity is, they’ll be done on VMware or VirtualBox that there’s no difference in the app.
Fire up VMware or VirtualBox setup and proceed with the installation.
VMware Workstation Setup
Once it’s finished, let it open.
Step Three – Create a New Virtual Machine
Once it’s done, open the VMware or VirtualBox and let it work.
So when it’s there, press Ctrl + N to open the new virtual machine wizard. This key works on both VMware & VirtualBox.
On VirtualBox, write down the name of the virtual machine which is Ubuntu and without making changes to its location and OS type and version, assign 50 – 60% of the system’s memory and then select Create a virtual hard disk file now and click on Create.
Create Virtual Machine
On this window, enter 20GB of file size or more and click Create.
The virtual machine should be created on VirtualBox now.
Ubuntu Virtual Machine
When the new virtual machine wizard is there, simply press Next.
On VMware, select Installer Disc Image file and browse the Ubuntu ISO then hit Next.
Install Disk Image File
Now put a name, username and a password for the machine, then hit Next.
Next up, specify a name and where the machine files should be stored and click Next.
Name The Machine
Then specify a hard disk space of at least 20GBs or more and hit Next.
At the end, uncheck the “Power on this virtual machine after creation” and click on Finish.
Step Four – Configure Virtual Machine Settings
In order to install Ubuntu, we need to set up machine settings.
The machine is now created, so click on Edit Virtual Machine Settings.
Edit Virtual Machine Settings
Then specify 50-60% of your system’s memory and also processor then hit OK.
For the processor, increase the amount of the processor from one to two or more then hit OK on the settings window.
Increase Processor
On VirtualBox, click on Settings.
Then select the Display tab, and increase the video memory size to the maximum and also enable 3d Acceleration.
Increase Video Memory
Without closing the settings window, select Storage and click on the “Empty” disc icon and from the right side click on disc icon and click Choose a disk file.
In this screen, browse the Ubuntu ISO image and click on Open.
Select it
When the ISO file is selected, click on OK.
Step Five – Install Ubuntu on VMware & VirtualBox
Once the machine is completely set up, we can now Install Ubuntu on VMware VirtualBox on Windows pretty easily.
From the window, click on Power on This Virtual Machine on VMware & VirtualBox.
From this part, the installation is pretty much the same so you can install it whether you’re installing it on VMware on Windows, on VMware on Mac, or on VirtualBox on Windows or on VirtualBox on Mac.
Power on This Machine
The machine will start the installation soon, so wait for it until it’s complete.
Note: We’re installing Ubuntu 19.10, and when a newer version is released, you can probably install it with this tutorial, there will be no huge changes in it.
Once it’s installed, it will appear this window.
Ubuntu Installed
So click anywhere on the screen and the account will appear, click on Ubuntu and then enter your password then hit Enter.
After a few startup screen, the desktop of the Ubuntu will appear, so there you go!
Ubuntu Vmware For Mac Osx
Ubuntu Desktop Screen
The Ubuntu has now installed and that’s there anytime, anywhere. It works super smooth and superfine. The best thing is, it has installed VMware Tools already so there’s no more steps to take. However, on VirtualBox, you can install VirtualBox Guest Tool from the steps below.
From here, you can try surfing, browsing and whatever you’ve in mind.
That’s it about Install Ubuntu on VMware VirtualBox on Windows . If there’s something remaining or would like to add or make some nice suggestions, we’re happy to hear.