There are a few options available for installing .NET Core on Linux systems and each requires a few actions before installing .NET Core. The sections below detail different methods for installing .NET Core and any prerequisites.
* [OS lifecycle support policy](https://github.com/dotnet/core/blob/master/os-lifecycle-policy.md)
* [Linux System Prerequisites](https://github.com/dotnet/core/blob/master/Documentation/linux-prereqs.md)
### Installation using a package manager
Before installing .NET using a package manager, you will need to register the Microsoft key, register the product repository, and install required dependencies. This only needs to be done once per machine.
Open a command prompt and run the commands below that match your distro:
# Ubuntu 18.04.1 by default does not configure Universe repository. .NET Core 2.1 depends on liblttng-ust0, which is available in the Universe repository.
Your system is now ready to install .NET Core. See the [Release Notes index](https://github.com/dotnet/core/tree/master/release-notes) for the latest available updates.
## Installation from a binary archive
Installing from the packages detailed above is recommended or you can install from binary archive, if that better suits your needs. When using binary archives to install, the contents must be extracted to a user location such as `$HOME/dotnet`, a symbolic link created for `dotnet` and a few dependencies installed. Dependency requirements for each distro can be seen in the [Linux System Prerequisites](https://github.com/dotnet/core/blob/master/Documentation/linux-prereqs.md) document.
```bash
mkdir -p $HOME/dotnet && tar zxf dotnet.tar.gz -C $HOME/dotnet
export PATH=$PATH:$HOME/dotnet
```
## Installation using Snap
We have been working on bringing .NET Core to Snap and are ready to hear what you think. Snaps, along with a few other technologies, are an emerging application installation and sandboxing technology which we think is pretty intriguing. The Snap install works well on Debian-based systems and other distros such as Fedora are having challenges that we're working to run down. The following steps can be used if you would like to give this a try.
* Visit [Snapcraft.io](https://snapcraft.io/) for guidance on preparing your system to use Snaps.
* As with our other installers, the Runtime and SDK are available depending on your needs. The SDK installation will include the .NET Core runtime and ASP.NET Core runtime.
