Welcome to the ultimate guide for beginners who want to learn how to install Kali Linux on VirtualBox!
If you’re taking your first steps into the world of information security, penetration testing, or simply want to explore the powerful Kali Linux operating system in a safe environment, you’ve come to the right place.
In this step-by-step tutorial, we’ll show you how to set up Kali Linux in a VirtualBox virtual machine simply and easily, even if you’ve never done it before.
Get ready to create your own cybersecurity lab and start mastering the tools of Kali Linux!
Downloading Kali Linux.
On the Kali Linux page, we can download both the “.iso” image and the ready-made virtual machine.
In my case, I prefer to create my virtual machine using the “.iso” image. This way, we will show all the steps for you to create your own virtual machine with Kali.
To download the “.iso” image, click on “installer images“.
Next, choose the architecture. In my case, I am using “x86_64“.
Creating the virtual machine with Kali Linux.
Now, let’s create the virtual machine. To create the virtual machine with Kali Linux, open VirtualBox and click on “Machine” and then “New“.
Next, we will enter the information that we will describe below.
- “Name“: we will enter the name of the virtual machine.
- “Folder“: the directory where we will store the virtual machine.
- “ISO Image“: the location of the “.iso” image that we downloaded.
- “Type“: type of operating system.
- “Version“: the version of the operating system architecture.
Now, let’s click on “hardware” and enter the amount of memory and processor cores.
For this installation, we will use the configurations below.
- “Base Memory“: we will use 2048 MB of RAM.
- “Processors“: we will use only one processor core.
Remember that these configurations can be modified to meet a greater or lesser demand from the applications that will run on your virtual machine.
The next step will be to choose how much memory can be allocated for the virtual machine.
In this case, we will leave the default as “25.00 GB” However, it is worth noting that we are using the “VirtualBox Disk Image – VDI” mode, and this allows us to use only what is necessary on the machine.
After clicking “Finish“, let’s double click on the image that appears there in VirtualBox as in the figure below.
Installing Kali Linux on VirtualBox
Now, let’s click “Graphical install” to boot the installation.
After that, we will choose the language that will be used in the installation.
Then we will choose the “time zone” or the country where Kali Linux will be installed.
Again, we will choose the combination of language and country with the encoding we will use.
Next, we will choose the type of keyboard language that we will use.
Now we can enter the name that the machine will have on the network.
If you have a domain server on your network you can now enter. In our case we do not have and therefore we will leave this field blank.
Now, let’s enter the full name of the user that we will use in the virtual machine with Kali Linux.
Next, we will enter the name of the user we will use in the virtual machine with Kali Linux.
The next step will be to enter the password for our user.
Now, let’s select the country that the system will use to configure the operating system clock.
Next, we will choose the disk partition that will be used. In our case, we will choose the entire disk because we are installing in a virtual machine of VirtualBox.
After that, we will see an image saying that the disk will be erased. It is important to check if the disk that was chosen was the virtual disk you had chosen.
The next step is to choose how the files will be installed on the disk. For this tutorial, we will choose all the files in only one partition “All files in one partition“.
Then we will check how the installation will be and we will click “Continue“.
Again we will see a warning that reminds us of the risks of losing data on the disk. However, in our case we are using a new virtual disk.
Now comes the step we can choose the desktop environment and other software that will be installed during installation. In our case, we choose the options of the figure below.
Next, we will select that we will use the “GRUB” to load the “boot” system.
We will inform you that the “GRUB” will be installed on the virtual disk we created.
Then we will see the message stating that the installation was done correctly and that we can restart the virtual machine by clicking “Continue“.
Testing VirtualBox Virtual Machine with Kali Linux
After the installation is completed, we can enter with a user that we registered and the password we had chosen.
Then we can see the Kali Linux home screen.
And congratulations you just installed Kali Linux on VirtualBox. I wish you much learning and professional success.
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Juliana Mascarenhas
Data Scientist and Master in Computer Modeling by LNCC.
Computer Engineer
