Virtualbox vbox not starting

If you've just installed VBox and it is not starting or working, the most common problem is usually that you don't have your kernel source installed, which means there is no kernel driver for vbox so it can't work.

You may get an error that says "Kernel driver not installed" in your Virtualbox.

So the first thing you should do is install your kernel source by running this:

sudo apt-get install linux-headers-`uname -r`

Then install the dkms/kernel module for vbox

sudo apt-get install virtualbox-dkms

`#`overall solution if it doesn't work still

sudo apt-get update sudo apt-get remove virtualbox virtualbox-qt virtualbox-dkms sudo apt-get install linux-headers-`uname -r` virtualbox-qt virtualbox-dkms --reinstall

Still not working? If you have secureboot, this could be why and you'll need to sign your vbox kernel module for things to work:

https://www.narenvadapalli.com/blog/virtualbox-ubuntu-secureboot-issue/

When things go wrong:

vboxweb.service is a disabled or a static unit, not starting it.
Job for virtualbox.service failed because the control process exited with error code. See "systemctl status virtualbox.service" and "journalctl -xe" for details. invoke-rc.d: initscript virtualbox, action "restart" failed. ● virtualbox.service - LSB: VirtualBox Linux kernel module Loaded: loaded (/etc/init.d/virtualbox; bad; vendor preset: enabled) Active: failed (Result: exit-code) since Sat 2019-07-20 15:01:39 PDT; 15ms ago Docs: man:systemd-sysv-generator(8) Process: 12405 ExecStart=/etc/init.d/virtualbox start (code=exited, status=1/FAILURE) Jul 20 15:01:39 areebuser-ZQ-Class systemd[1]: Starting LSB: VirtualBox Linux kernel module... Jul 20 15:01:39 areebuser-ZQ-Class virtualbox[12405]: * Loading VirtualBox kernel modules... Jul 20 15:01:39 areebuser-ZQ-Class virtualbox[12405]: * No suitable module for running kernel found Jul 20 15:01:39 areebuser-ZQ-Class virtualbox[12405]: ...fail! Jul 20 15:01:39 areebuser-ZQ-Class systemd[1]: virtualbox.service: Control process exited, code=exited status=1 Jul 20 15:01:39 areebuser-ZQ-Class systemd[1]: Failed to start LSB: VirtualBox Linux kernel module. Jul 20 15:01:39 areebuser-ZQ-Class systemd[1]: virtualbox.service: Unit entered failed state. Jul 20 15:01:39 areebuser-ZQ-Class systemd[1]: virtualbox.service: Failed with result 'exit-code'. -- Unit virtualbox.service has begun starting up. Jul 20 15:01:39 areebuser-ZQ-Class virtualbox[12405]: * Loading VirtualBox kernel modules... Jul 20 15:01:39 areebuser-ZQ-Class virtualbox[12405]: * No suitable module for running kernel found Jul 20 15:01:39 areebuser-ZQ-Class virtualbox[12405]: ...fail! Jul 20 15:01:39 areebuser-ZQ-Class systemd[1]: virtualbox.service: Control

Reading package lists... Done Building dependency tree Reading state information... Done The following NEW packages will be installed: virtualbox-dkms 0 upgraded, 1 newly installed, 0 to remove and 85 not upgraded. Need to get 0 B/651 kB of archives. After this operation, 5,305 kB of additional disk space will be used. Selecting previously unselected package virtualbox-dkms. (Reading database ... 277724 files and directories currently installed.) Preparing to unpack .../virtualbox-dkms_5.1.38-dfsg-0ubuntu1.16.04.3_all.deb ... Unpacking virtualbox-dkms (5.1.38-dfsg-0ubuntu1.16.04.3) ... Setting up virtualbox-dkms (5.1.38-dfsg-0ubuntu1.16.04.3) ... Loading new virtualbox-5.1.38 DKMS files... First Installation: checking all kernels... Building only for 4.8.0-58-generic Module build for the currently running kernel was skipped since the kernel source for this kernel does not seem to be installed. Job for virtualbox.service failed because the control process exited with error code. See "systemctl status virtualbox.service" and "journalctl -xe" for details. invoke-rc.d: initscript virtualbox, action "restart" failed. ● virtualbox.service - LSB: VirtualBox Linux kernel module Loaded: loaded (/etc/init.d/virtualbox; bad; vendor preset: enabled) Active: failed (Result: exit-code) since Mon 2019-07-22 16:43:23 PDT; 12ms ago Docs: man:systemd-sysv-generator(8) Process: 3046 ExecStart=/etc/init.d/virtualbox start (code=exited, status=1/FAILURE) Jul 22 16:43:23 user-ZQ-Class systemd[1]: Starting LSB: VirtualBox Linu.... Jul 22 16:43:23 user-ZQ-Class virtualbox[3046]: * Loading VirtualBox ke... Jul 22 16:43:23 user-ZQ-Class virtualbox[3046]: * No suitable module fo... Jul 22 16:43:23 user-ZQ-Class virtualbox[3046]: ...fail! Jul 22 16:43:23 user-ZQ-Class systemd[1]: virtualbox.service: Control p...1 Jul 22 16:43:23 user-ZQ-Class systemd[1]: Failed to start LSB: VirtualB.... Jul 22 16:43:23 user-ZQ-Class systemd[1]: virtualbox.service: Unit ente.... Jul 22 16:43:23 user-ZQ-Class systemd[1]: virtualbox.service: Failed wi.... Hint: Some lines were ellipsized, use -l to show in full.