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What Is Wine for Linux, and How Does It Work?

Sydney Butler

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  • It’s short for “WINE Is Not an Emulator,” which will make sense when I tell you that WINE is a program that lets Windows software run on Linux or macOS.
  • The basic process goes a little like this:
    1. The Windows application makes a request, such as opening a file or displaying a window.
    2. WINE intercepts this, and translates the request into the equivalent a native Linux application would have made.
    3. Linux carries out the request, and WINE does the same thing but in the opposite direction.
  • WINE has also traditionally been a popular way to get Windows games to work on Linux. Modern Linux gaming, such as on Steam Deck, makes use of a specialized compatibility layer called Proton, which contains at least in part a modified version of the main WINE program.