How to Install Cursor IDE on Manjaro Linux

Cursor is distributed for Linux as an AppImage, which works well on Manjaro because you do not need to wait for a package in the official repositories or the AUR.

Before writing this post, I tried installing Cursor from the AUR, but it was not stable enough for me. I also did not love the extra Electron dependency, although that was not the main reason I moved away from that method. At the time of writing, there is no official Snap release, no official Manjaro or Arch package for Cursor either.

So this guide uses Cursor’s official download API to find the current stable AppImage. I usually prefer keeping AppImages under ~/.local/opt and exposing only a small launcher command from ~/.local/bin.

This keeps the installation local to your user, easy to update, and easy to remove.

Install the Required Packages

First make sure curl and fuse2 are installed. fuse2 is useful because many AppImages still depend on it.

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sudo pacman -Syu curl fuse2

Create a Directory for Cursor

Create a dedicated directory for the Cursor AppImage:

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mkdir -p ~/.local/opt/cursor

Download the Latest Cursor AppImage

Download the Cursor AppImage into that directory:

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curl -L "https://api2.cursor.sh/updates/download/golden/linux-x64/cursor/" \
  -o ~/.local/opt/cursor/cursor.AppImage

Then make it executable:

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chmod +x ~/.local/opt/cursor/cursor.AppImage

Create the cursor Command

Create ~/.local/bin if it does not already exist:

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mkdir -p ~/.local/bin

Then create a symlink so you can start Cursor from the terminal:

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ln -sf ~/.local/opt/cursor/cursor.AppImage ~/.local/bin/cursor

Make sure ~/.local/bin is in your PATH. If you use Zsh, add this to ~/.zshrc if it is not already there:

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export PATH="$HOME/.local/bin:$PATH"

Reload your shell:

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source ~/.zshrc

Now test it:

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cursor

Extract the Cursor Icon

For a proper desktop launcher, you need an icon file. The AppImage already contains one, so you can extract it:

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cd ~/.local/opt/cursor

./cursor.AppImage --appimage-extract

cp \
  ~/.local/opt/cursor/squashfs-root/usr/share/icons/hicolor/512x512/apps/cursor.png \
  ~/.local/opt/cursor/cursor.png

rm -rf ~/.local/opt/cursor/squashfs-root

Create the Desktop Entry

Create the desktop applications directory:

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mkdir -p ~/.local/share/applications

Then create the desktop entry:

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nano ~/.local/share/applications/cursor.desktop

Use this content, but replace YOUR_USER with your real Linux username:

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[Desktop Entry]
Name=Cursor
Exec=/home/YOUR_USER/.local/opt/cursor/cursor.AppImage
Icon=/home/YOUR_USER/.local/opt/cursor/cursor.png
Type=Application
Categories=Development;
Terminal=false
StartupNotify=true

For example, if your username is omid, the paths should start with /home/omid/....

After saving the file, make it executable:

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chmod +x ~/.local/share/applications/cursor.desktop

You should now be able to find Cursor in your application launcher.

Install Script (Recommended)

The manual steps above are useful to understand what is happening, but for day-to-day use I keep the logic in a small script instead of a long copy-paste block.

Download it once:

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mkdir -p ~/.local/bin
curl -fsSL https://omid.dev/scripts/update-cursor.sh -o ~/.local/bin/update-cursor
chmod +x ~/.local/bin/update-cursor

If you prefer to inspect the source first, it lives in the repo at static/scripts/update-cursor.sh.

After that, installing or updating Cursor is just:

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update-cursor

The script compares the installed version in ~/.local/opt/cursor/version.txt with the latest stable release from Cursor’s API. If you already have the same version, or a newer one, it skips the download. To reinstall anyway:

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update-cursor --force

To remove Cursor completely, including the AppImage, icon, desktop entry, cursor command, and the update-cursor script itself:

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update-cursor --uninstall

If Cursor is open while you update it, close it first, run update-cursor, and then start it again.