NVIDIA Linux driver has reached 560 release series. Here’s how to install it or the 555 series in Ubuntu 24.04, Ubuntu 22.04, Ubuntu 20.04, and their based systems.

NVIDIA 560 so far is the latest new feature branch driver for Linux. It added support VRR (Variable Refresh Rate) on notebooks with the open kernel modules, as well as for Wayland on pre-Volta GPUs.

As well, there are multiple concurrent clients support to NvFBC direct capture, PipeWire backend to NvFBC, and EGL_KHR_platform_x11 and EGL_EXT_platform_xcb on Xwayland. See release note for more.

For NVIDIA 555, it uses GSP firmware by default on all GPUs that support it, which acts like a CPU embedded into the GPU that can offload GPU initialization and management tasks.

The 555 driver enabled HDMI 10 bits per component support by default. It also has better Wayland support. It now has less screen tearing, and supports linux-drm-syncobj-v1 protocol for explicit synchronization in EGL. For more about the new driver, see the release page.

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This is a step by step beginner’s guide shows how to install NVIDIA proprietary driver in Ubuntu. And, how to switch between Intel/AMD and NVIDIA GPU, run specific app/game with NVIDIA while leaving others rendered by integrated graphics card.

While installing Ubuntu, the wizard provides an option to install the NVIDIA proprietary driver alongside. If you didn’t enable that option, then here’s how to manually install it afterward.

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NVIDIA 520, the latest feature release of NVIDIA driver for Linux, is available to install in all current Ubuntu LTS releases.

So far, it’s NVIDIA 520.56.06 released few weeks ago with following new features:

• Implement over-the-air (OTA )updates in the Proton and Wine NVIDIA NGX build, though needs to set “PROTON_ENABLE_NGX_UPDATER” to 1 to enable it.
• Following extensions no longer depend on nvidia-uvm.ko at runtime:
  • VK_KHR_acceleration_structure
  • VK_KHR_deferred_host_operations
  • VK_KHR_ray_query
  • VK_KHR_ray_tracing_pipeline
  • VK_NV_cuda_kernel_launch
  • VK_NV_ray_tracing
  • VK_NV_ray_tracing_motion_blur
  • VK_NVX_binary_import
  • VK_NVX_image_view_handle
• Fixed blank screens and hangs when starting an X server on RTX 30 series GPUs boot with HDMI.
• Fixed a bug where Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered would sometimes crash with Xid 13 errors on Turing and later

How to Install NVIDIA 520 in Ubuntu

NOTE: Though it’s tested and works good in my case, it might still breaks your system (usually boot into blank screen) due to various reasons (e.g., upstream bug or corrupt installation)! So don’t do it in production machine!

The driver package is available now for Ubuntu 18.04, Ubuntu 20.04, and Ubuntu 22.04. For Ubuntu 22.10 user, it’s so far in pre-released repository, though should be published soon in next few days.

1. First, it’s HIGHLY recommended to update system by launching ‘Software Updater‘ and install all available updates! And, restart your system if it asks.

2. Second, search for and open ‘Additional Drivers‘ from Activities overview screen.

3. When it opens, choose “nvidia-driver-520” from the list, and click ‘Apply Changes’ button to install the driver.

In case you don’t see the 520 driver in the list, navigate to the first ‘Ubuntu Software’ tab, and make sure the 4 repositories (main, universe, restricted, multiverse) are enabled. Finally, close and Reload, and re-open the utility.

After installation, the ‘Additional Drivers‘ utility should prompt to restart your computer to apply change.

Verify

After restarting computer, open ‘Settings‘ and navigate to ‘About‘ page to verify if your NVIDIA graphics card is in use.

And, search for and open ‘NVIDIA Settings‘ utility to for driver version, GPU switching, and other settings.

Due to bug, you can’t switch to Intel (Power Saving Mode) with the tool, you can however install an extension to do the job via system status menu option.

Install ‘Prime indicator’ for switching GPU

For Ubuntu 22.04, search for and install ‘Extension Manager‘ from Ubuntu Software app. Then, use the tool to search and install ‘Prime Inidcator’.

For Ubuntu 20.04 and Ubuntu 18.04, first open terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and run command to install the agent package:

sudo apt install chrome-gnome-shell

Then visit the extension web page and use the ON/OFF switch to install it:

In case you don’t see the ON/OFF switch, follow the link in that page to install browser extension and refresh.

After installing the extension, go to top-right system status menu to switch between Intel, NVIDIA, and hybrid mode.

IMPORTANT: The Extension will automatically log out once your select another GPU mode and confirm with password!!! Save your works before doing change.

This simple tutorial shows how to install the NVIDIA proprietary driver in Ubuntu 22.04 and switch between dedicated and integrated GPU.

Since Ubuntu provides the proprietary driver packages via its restricted repositories, user may install NVIDIA driver as easy as a few clicks.

Install NVIDIA Driver

1.) Firstly, click on top-left corner ‘Activities‘, and then search for and open ‘Softwre & Updates’ utility.

When the tool opens, make sure the “Proprietary drives for devices (restricted)” is enabled.

Make sure ‘restricted’ repository enabled

2.) Next, navigate to ‘Additional Drivers‘ tab. There it should list all available graphics drivers.

If it shows nothing, press Ctrl+Alt+T to open terminal and run command sudo apt update to refresh package cache. Then re-launch the ‘Software & Updates’ utility.

Choose one of the drivers from the list and click on ‘Apply Changes‘ to install it. There will be a little bar indicates the installing process. When done, restart your computer!

Switch between NVIDIA and Intel Graphics:

After restart, your machine will be on performance mode with the dedicated GPU. To switch GPU mode, search for and open ‘NVIDIA X Server Settings‘.

When the app opens, navigate to ‘PRIME Profiles‘. Then you’ll see three options available in the right:

• NVIDIA (Performance Mode) – use dedicated NVIDIA GPU to render Ubuntu desktop.
• NVIDIA On-Demand – use integrated graphics to render desktop, but possible to offload specific apps via dedicated GPU.
• Intel (Power Saving Mode) – use integrated graphics to render Ubuntu desktop.

In my case, the “Intel (Power Saving Mode)” is somehow grayed out. As a workaround, choose Intel graphics card by running sudo prime-select intel in terminal.

Changing GPU mode however needs log out and back in to apply changes.

Run certain apps via NVIDIA GPU while rendering desktop via integrated graphics

By setting GPU mode to “NVIDIA On-Demand”, you may run certain apps via NVIDIA GPU, while others handled by the integrated GPU.

1.) For CUDA apps, you need to run command in terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) to install the nvidia-cuda-toolkit package.

sudo apt install nvidia-cuda-toolkit

Then there’ll be application-specific menu to tell it which device to use.

2.) For other apps, just use the following environment variables.

__NV_PRIME_RENDER_OFFLOAD=1
__GLX_VENDOR_LIBRARY_NAME=nvidia

You can do this by launching apps from command line. For example, launch SuperTuxkart (a kart racing game) via command:

__NV_PRIME_RENDER_OFFLOAD=1 __GLX_VENDOR_LIBRARY_NAME=nvidia supertuxkart

Or, edit the application’s .desktop file which is usually under “/user/share/applications” directory. And, change the line of ‘Exec’ to:

Exec=env __NV_PRIME_RENDER_OFFLOAD=1 __GLX_VENDOR_LIBRARY_NAME=nvidia supertuxkart

Add System Menu option to Switch CPU

To make it easy to switch between your GPUs, there’s a Gnome Extension available to add options into system tray menu.

1.) To get the menu option, you need to first install the open-source EnvyControl tool. Press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open terminal, and run the command below one by one:

• Use git command to grab the source:

  git clone https://github.com/geminis3/envycontrol.git

• Navigate to the source folder, and install it for global use via pip package manager:

  cd envycontrol && sudo pip3 install .

If the pip3 command does not exist, run sudo apt install python3-pip command to install it.

As the project page mentioned, users have to run the following 2 commands one by one to prevent Ubuntu’s own gpu-manager from interfering:

sudo prime-select on-demand

sudo systemctl disable gpu-manager.service

2.) Next, run command to make sure you have the agent packages installed for installing Gnome Extensions:

sudo apt install chrome-gnome-shell gnome-shell-extension-prefs

3.) Finally, go to the extension page and turn on the slider icon to install it:

NOTE 1: The pre-installed Firefox does not support this stuff so far! Use another browser, or install back Firefox as classic deb package.

NOTE 2: If you don’t see the on/off switch in that page, click the ‘click here to install browser extension‘ to install extension for your web browser and refresh the page.

The menu option should appear immediately after successfully installed the extension. If not, press Windows (Super) key on keyboard or click “Activities” on top panel, and then search for and open the “Gnome Extensions” app to manage your extension.