How To Install DaVinci Resolve on Omarchy (2026 Guide)

There are numerous articles and threads out there around the troubles and required workarounds when installing and running DaVinci Resolve on Arch Linux.

And if you’re running Omarchy, an opinionated distribution based on Arch Linux and the tiling window manager Hyprland, you’ve probably seen at least one of the following outcomes from others attempting to install DaVinci Resolve there:

Resolve doesn’t launch at all (no error, no logs, just crickets 🦗)
The UI opens but is comically small
It technically runs… but crashes randomly or behaves strangely

In this post, I’m going to show you the exact setup that worked for me to get DaVinci Resolve (20.3.1 at the time of this article) running smoothly on Omarchy with an NVIDIA GPU.

And this isn’t a “I think this should work” guide. I did a fresh install right before writing this to make sure the steps are clean and repeatable.

Note: This guide is specifically for NVIDIA GPUs.

My Setup

OS: Omarchy (Arch Linux)
Compositor: Hyprland (Wayland)
GPU: NVIDIA RTX 3080
Driver: NVIDIA proprietary drivers
CUDA / OpenCL: Installed system-wide

Step 1: Install NVIDIA Compute Libraries (CUDA + OpenCL)

DaVinci Resolve relies heavily on NVIDIA’s proprietary stack. Without CUDA and OpenCL, it simply won’t initialize.

sudo pacman -S --needed opencl-nvidia cuda

Why these matter

cuda: Required for Resolve’s GPU-accelerated processing
opencl-nvidia: Enables OpenCL support, which Resolve expects even when using CUDA

If these are missing, Resolve will usually fail silently.

Step 2: Install DaVinci Resolve via the AUR (Manual Download Required)

We’ll use the AUR (Arch User Repository), but not in the usual one-command way.

Blackmagic Design requires account registration before downloading DaVinci Resolve, which means yay cannot fetch the installer automatically.

You also can’t place the installer directly in the AUR cache directory, because yay must first create the expected directory structure during the build.

The solution

The correct workflow is to run the AUR install normally and allow it to compile its large Qt dependencies and prepare the Resolve runtime. The process will only fail at the final stage when the installer ZIP is missing. At that point, we’ll provide the ZIP file and rerun the install.

Start the install normally:

yay -S davinci-resolve

This will run for quite some time as it builds and compiles large Qt dependencies from source (this can take around 45 minutes but will be cached on the second run, thankfully). In the end, however, it will fail and tell you which directory it expected the DaVinci Resolve ZIP file in (most likely ~/.cache/yay/davinci-resolve/).

Download the Linux version of DaVinci Resolve from: https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/davinciresolve

Make sure the version matches what the AUR package expects (20.3.1 at the time of writing).

Copy the downloaded ZIP into the directory yay mentioned:

cp ~/Downloads/DaVinci_Resolve_20.3.1_Linux.zip ~/.cache/yay/davinci-resolve/

Run the install again:

yay -S davinci-resolve

… and yay will detect the ZIP and complete the build successfully.

Step 3: Create a User-Local Launcher

Now instead of editing system files, copy the desktop launcher to your local directory:

cp /usr/share/applications/DaVinciResolve.desktop ~/.local/share/applications/

This allows us to safely customize how Resolve launches.

Step 4: Fix Wayland Crashes and UI Scaling (Critical Step)

Open the local launcher file:

~/.local/share/applications/DaVinciResolve.desktop

Find the line starting with Exec= and replace it with:

Exec=env QT_QPA_PLATFORM=xcb QT_AUTO_SCREEN_SCALE_FACTOR=0 QT_SCREEN_SCALE_FACTORS=1.75 QT_SCALE_FACTOR=1.75 /opt/resolve/bin/resolve %u

What this does

On Omarchy, you’re running Hyprland on Wayland, but DaVinci Resolve is still a Qt + X11-centric app. These environment variables force Resolve into a stable, predictable rendering and scaling mode.

QT_QPA_PLATFORM=xcb Forces Qt to use X11 (via XWayland) instead of native Wayland
QT_AUTO_SCREEN_SCALE_FACTOR=0 Disables Qt’s broken automatic DPI scaling
QT_SCREEN_SCALE_FACTORS / QT_SCALE_FACTOR Fixes the tiny UI issue on high-resolution displays by explicitly setting scaling

Adjust the scale value (1.5, 1.75, 2.0, etc.) to taste. A 1.75 scale was the sweet spot for me.

Hyprland Tip: Fix Blurry UI After Scaling (XWayland)

If DaVinci Resolve now launches at the correct size but the text looks slightly blurry, this is a Hyprland-specific issue.

When you apply fractional scaling (like 1.75x), Hyprland will sometimes scale XWayland applications instead of letting them render at native resolution. DaVinci Resolve is an X11 app, so this results in soft or fuzzy UI text.

To force pixel-perfect rendering, add the following to your hyprland.conf:

xwayland {
  force_zero_scaling = true
}

Step 5: Verify GPU Usage and Understand Codec Limitations

Launch DaVinci Resolve. It should now open cleanly and at a usable size.

Final checks

GPU Configuration Go to DaVinci Resolve → Preferences → Memory and GPU
- Ensure your NVIDIA GPU is selected
- Set processing mode to CUDA
Codec Limitation (Important) The free version of DaVinci Resolve on Linux cannot decode H.264 / H.265.

If you import MP4 footage and see “Media Offline,” this is why.

Your options

Upgrade to DaVinci Resolve Studio
Transcode footage to ProRes or DNxHR using FFmpeg before importing. Example: ffmpeg -i input.mp4 -c:v prores_ks -profile:v 3 -c:a pcm_s16le output.mov

Final Thoughts

This setup isn’t officially supported, but it is stable, repeatable, and works well on Omarchy with Hyprland.

Linux video editing on bleeding-edge distros still takes effort—but once Resolve is running, it performs extremely well on NVIDIA hardware.

Have you run into any issues or found any better ways to do this? If so, let me know down below in the comments.