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Proxmox/Install Arch Linux as a guest

From ArchWiki

Proxmox Virtual Environment also known as Proxmox VE is an open-source hypervisor used to run operating systems in a special environment, called a virtual machine, on top of the existing operating system. It comes with a WebUI interface.

This article is about installing Arch Linux in Proxmox.


Virtual machine installation

To create a virtual machine, first you need to upload an image to Proxmox. This can be done by going to one of the storage entries in the GUI, like local, and selecting ISO Images.

After this is done you can create a virtual machine either by clicking on the blue Create VM button and going through the installer or running the following command:

qm create 100 --memory 8192 --cdrom local:iso/archlinux-2025.08.01-x86_64.iso --net0 virtio,bridge=vmbr0 --scsi0 local-lvm:32 --start

Available install images can be listed with

pvesm list local

Container installation

First a container template should be downloaded

pveam update
pveam available
pveam download local archlinux-base_20240911-1_amd64.tar.zst

As of writing, Proxmox 9 has not configured any Arch templates to be downloadable through its tools so they must be downloaded manually through http://download.proxmox.com/images/system/ and placed in /var/lib/vz/template/cache

Then a container can be created from the template either by clicking on the blue Create CT button and going through the installer or running the following command:

pct create 100 local:vztmpl/archlinux-base_20240911-1_amd64.tar.zst --rootfs local-lvm:4 --memory 8192 --net0 name=eth0,bridge=vmbr0,ip=dhcp --features nesting=1

Once configured, a template can be created out of the container which can then be cloned

pct template 100
pct clone 100 101 --hostname cloned_name


Installation using Arch Linux cloud image and Cloud-init

See Arch Linux on a VPS#Official Arch Linux cloud image.