How to Install Visual Studio Code on Ubuntu 20.04

Visual Studio Code is an open source and cross-platform code editor developed by Microsoft. It includes support for debugging, embedded Git control and GitHub, syntax highlighting, intelligent code completion, snippets, and code refactoring. You can extend Visual Studio Code functionality using extensions. In this tutorial, we will show you how to install Visual Studio Code on Ubuntu 20.04 Focal Fossa.

Prerequisites#

Before you start installation, Make sure you are logged in with non-root user account with sudo privileges.

Install Visual Studio Code on Ubuntu#

We will install Visual Studio Code from the official Microsoft apt repositories. Perform the following steps to install VS Code on your Ubuntu 20.04 system:

1. Update the packages index list and install dependencies using below command:

sudo apt update

sudo apt install software-properties-common apt-transport-https wget

2. Import the Microsoft GPG key using the following wget command:

wget -q https://packages.microsoft.com/keys/microsoft.asc -O- | sudo apt-key add -

Type the following to enable the Visual Studio Code repository:

sudo add-apt-repository "deb [arch=amd64] https://packages.microsoft.com/repos/vscode stable main"

3. Once the repository enabled, again update packages index list and install VS Code package:

sudo apt update

sudo apt install code

That’s it. You have successfully install Visual Studio Code on your Ubuntu desktop and it’s ready to use.

Start Visual Studio Code#

Now Visual Studio Code is installed on your system. You can launch it using terminal by typing code or by clicking on the VS Code icon (Activities -> Visual Studio Code).

When it will launch first time by your system it will look screen like as below:

Now you can use and customize the Visual Studio Code by installing extensions.

Update Visual Studio Code#

You can update the Visual Studio Code when a new version is released. You can update it through your desktop standard Software Update tool. Alternatively, you can update by running the following commands in your terminal:

sudo apt update

sudo apt upgrade

Conclusion#

We have explained how to install Visual Studio Code on your Ubuntu 20.04 system. You can install extensions and configuring VS Code according to your preferences. Install Additional Components and customize your User and Workspace Settings. To get more details about VS Code visit their official documentation page.

If you have any questions or suggestion, please leave a comment below.