Usually, you don’t need a GPU on your Proxmox VE server to run the virtual machines. But if you want to enable the 3D acceleration (using VirtIO-GL or VirGL) on your Proxmox VE virtual machines, or passthrough a GPU on a Proxmox VE container for AI/CUDA acceleration, you will need a GPU and the required GPU drivers installed on your Proxmox VE server.

In this article, we will show you how to install the latest version of the official NVIDIA GPU drivers on Proxmox VE 8 so that you can use it for VirIO-GL/VirGL 3D acceleration on your Proxmox VE virtual machines or passthrough your NVIDIA GPU on Proxmox VE containers for AI/CUDA acceleration.

Topic of Contents:

1. Checking If an NVIDIA GPU Is Installed on Your Proxmox VE Server
2. Enabling the Proxmox VE Community Package Repositories (Optional for Enterprise Users)
3. Updating the Proxmox VE Package Database Cache
4. Installing the Proxmox VE Kernel Headers on Proxmox VE
5. Installing the Required Dependencies for NVIDIA GPU Drivers on Proxmox VE
6. Downloading the Latest Version of NVIDIA GPU Drivers for Proxmox VE
7. Installing the NVIDIA GPU Drivers on Proxmox VE
8. Checking If the NVIDIA GPU Drivers Are Installed Correctly on Proxmox VE
9. Conclusion

Checking If an NVIDIA GPU Is Installed on Your Proxmox VE Server

To install the NVIDIA GPU drivers on your Proxmox VE server, you must have an NVIDIA GPU hardware installed on your server. If you need any assistance in verifying whether you have an NVIDIA GPU hardware available/installed on your server, read this article.

Enabling the Proxmox VE Community Package Repositories (Optional for Enterprise Users)

If you don’t have a Proxmox VE enterprise subscription, you must enable the Proxmox VE community package repositories to install the required header files to compile the NVIDIA GPU drivers for your Proxmox VE server.

Updating the Proxmox VE Package Database Cache

Once you have the Proxmox VE community package repositories enabled, navigate to pve > Shell from the Proxmox VE dashboard and run the following command to update the Proxmox VE package database cache:

Installing Proxmox VE Kernel Headers on Proxmox VE

The Proxmox VE kernel headers are required to compile the NVIDIA GPU drivers kernel modules.

To install the Proxmox VE kernel headers on your Proxmox VE server, run the following command:

The Promox VE kernel headers should be installed on your Proxmox VE server.

Installing the Required Dependencies for NVIDIA GPU Drivers on Proxmox VE

To build the NVIDIA GPU drivers kernel modules, you need to install some dependency packages on your Proxmox VE server as well.

To install all the required dependency packages on your Proxmox VE server, run the following command:

To confirm the installation, press “Y” and then press <Enter>.

The required dependency packages are being downloaded from the internet. It takes a while to complete.

The required dependency packages are being installed. It takes a while to complete.

At this point, the required dependency packages should be installed on your Proxmox VE server.

Downloading the Latest Version of NVIDIA GPU Drivers for Proxmox VE

To download the latest version of the official NVIDIA GPU drivers installer file for Proxmox VE, visit the NVIDIA Drivers Downloads page from any web browser.

Once the page loads, select your GPU from the “Product Type”, “Product Series”, and “Product” dropdown menus^[1]. Select “Linux 64-bit” as the “Operating System”^[2], “Production Branch” as the “Download Type”^[3], and click on “Search”^[4].

Click on “Download”.

Right-click (RMB) on “Agree & Download” and click on “Copy Link” to copy the download link of the NVIDIA GPU Drivers installer file.

Now, go back to the Proxmox VE shell and type in the “wget” command ^[1], press <Space Bar>, right-click (RMB) on the Proxmox VE shell, and click on “Paste”^[2] to paste the NVIDIA GPU drivers download link.

Once the download link is pasted on the Proxmox VE shell, press <Enter> to run the NVIDIA GPU drivers download command:

The NVIDIA GPU drivers installation file is being downloaded. It takes a while to complete.

At this point, the NVIDIA GPU drivers installer file should be downloaded.

You can find the NVIDIA GPU drivers installer file (NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-535.146.02.run in our case) in the home directory of your Proxmox VE server.

Installing the NVIDIA GPU Drivers on Proxmox VE

Before you can run the NVIDIA GPU drivers installer file on your Proxmox VE server, add executable permission to the NVIDIA GPU drivers installer file as follows:

Now, run the NVIDIA GPU drivers installer file as follows:

The NVIDIA GPU drivers are now being installed on your Proxmox VE server. It takes a while to compile all the NVIDIA GPU drivers kernel modules for Proxmox VE server.

When you’re asked to install the NVIDIA 32-bit compatibility libraries, select “Yes” and press <Enter>.

The NVIDIA GPU drivers installation should continue.

Once you see the following prompt, select “Yes” and press <Enter>.

Press <Enter>.

The NVIDIA GPU drivers should be installed on your Proxmox VE server.

For the changes to take effect, restart your Proxmox VE server with the following command:

Checking If the NVIDIA GPU Drivers Are Installed Correctly on Proxmox VE

To check whether the NVIDIA GPU drivers are installed correctly on your Proxmox VE server, run the following command from your Proxmox VE shell:

If the NVIDIA GPU drivers are installed correctly on your Proxmox VE server, the NVIDIA kernel modules should be loaded as you can see in the following screenshot:

You can also use the “nvidia-smi” command to verify whether the NVIDIA GPU drivers are working correctly. As you can see, the “nvidia-smi” command shows that we have the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 (12GB)^[1][2] version installed on our Proxmox VE server and we are using the NVIDIA GPU drivers version 535.146.02^[3].

Conclusion

In this article, we showed you how to download and install the latest version of the official NVIDIA GPU drivers on your Proxmox VE server. The NVIDIA GPU drivers must be installed on your Proxmox VE server if you want to use your NVIDIA GPU to enable the VirtIO-GL/VirGL 3D acceleration on Proxmox VE virtual machines or passthrough the NVIDIA GPU to Proxmox VE LXC containers for AI/CUDA acceleration.