My wife was using MakeMKV on
her Microsoft Windows 11 system and wanted to continue to use that
application when I transitioned her to
Ubuntu Linux.
I discovered that there is a
Snap package
for Ubuntu, which you can install by clicking on the Show Apps
icon at the lower, left-hand corner of the Ubuntu desktop, then
typing App Center in the Type to search field, then
clicking on it when it is shown, and searching on MakeMKV
in the Search for apps field. I can not recommend installing
the MakeMKV Snap package on Ubuntu, though, since after spending hours
on trying to get MakeMKV to allow me to rip discs with it, I finally
gave up and uninstalled the Snap MakeMKV package. I had seen that
the App Center showed 251 votes for the package with an overall rating
of "poor", but I thought I might be able to resolve any problem I
encountered, but I finally gave up after spending too much time trying
to get it to work. I've listed the steps I took to try to get it to
work below.
The Snap package was created by Lucy Llewellyn who has a GitHub
for the software at
diddlesnaps / makemkv. After you've installed it, you can see
further information on it by issuing the command snap info
makemkv in a
Terminal window
(be sure to use all lower case letters for MakeMKV, i.e., use
makemkv for the package name).
alice@Wonderland:~$ snap info makemkv name: makemkv summary: Backup your DVD and Bluray discs publisher: Lucy Llewellyn (lucyllewy✪) store-url: https://snapcraft.io/makemkv contact: https://github.com/diddlesnaps/makemkv/issues license: unset description: | MakeMKV is your one-click solution to convert video that you own into free and patents-unencumbered format that can be played everywhere. MakeMKV is a format converter, otherwise called "transcoder". It converts the video clips from proprietary (and usually encrypted) disc into a set of MKV files, preserving most information but not changing it in any way. The MKV format can store multiple video/audio tracks with all meta-information and preserve chapters. There are many players that can play MKV files nearly on all platforms, and there are tools to convert MKV files to many formats, including DVD and Blu-ray discs. Additionally MakeMKV can instantly stream decrypted video without intermediate conversion to wide range of players, so you may watch Blu-ray and DVD discs with your favorite player on your favorite OS or on your favorite device. - Reads DVD and Blu-ray discs - Reads Blu-ray discs protected with latest versions of AACS and BD+ - Preserves all video and audio tracks, including HD audio - Preserves chapters information - Preserves all meta-information (track language, audio type) - Fast conversion - converts as fast as your drive can read data. - No additional software is required for conversion or decryption. - Available for Windows, Mac OS X and Linux - Functionality to open DVD discs is free and will always stay free. - All features (including Blu-ray decryption and processing) are free during BETA. -- - Upstream Project: https://www.makemkv.com/ - snapcraft.yaml Build Definition: https://github.com/diddlesnaps/makemkv/blob/master/snap/snapcraft.yaml commands: - makemkv - makemkv.makemkvcon snap-id: oQi5445Bw83J591pCgmPm8lCBNkvrL0w tracking: latest/stable refresh-date: today at 20:25 EDT channels: latest/stable: 1.18.3 2026-02-23 (681) 342MB - latest/candidate: ↑ latest/beta: ↑ latest/edge: 1.18.3 2026-03-28 (701) 342MB - installed: 1.18.3 (681) 342MB - alice@Wonderland:~$
Once you've installed it, you can open it from the App Center, which will result in a window like the one below opening.
When I started it, I saw "Loading..." and "Please wait", but that status remained even after 10 minutes and I saw the following at the bottom of the window:
MakeMKV v1.18.3 linux(x64-release) started
Automatic checking for updates is enabled, you may disable it in preferences if you don't want MakeMKV to contact web server.
Failed to get full access to drive "PIONEER BD-RW BDR-XS07U". Make sure that you either have write access to device "/dev/sr0", are member of "cdrom" group or have CAP_SYS_RAWIO enabled.
When I checked the members of the cdrom group, I found
that her account was not a member of the group.
alice@Wonderland:~$ grep cdrom /etc/group cdrom:x:24:jim alice@Wonderland:~$
You can add someone to a group with the command
sudo adduser username groupname where
username is the relevant user name and groupname is the
name of the group to which you wish to add the user, e.g., cdrom in this
case. I added her account to the cdrom group with that command, then
logged out and back in to have the change in effect, but
when I closed and reopened MakeMKV, I saw the same error message regarding
failure to access the
optical disk
drive.
I checked the access to /dev/sr0 and saw that members
of the cdrom group did have read and write access to the device.
alice@Wonderland:~/Documents/MakeMKV$ ls -l /dev/sr0 brw-rw----+ 1 root cdrom 11, 0 Mar 28 20:51 /dev/sr0 alice@Wonderland:~/Documents/MakeMKV$
Note: /dev/cdrom points to this directory. The
"sr" stands for SCSI Removable as Linux handles USB optical drives using
SCSI emulation.
alice@Wonderland:~$ ls -l /dev/cdrom lrwxrwxrwx+ 1 root root 3 Mar 28 07:09 /dev/cdrom -> sr0
You can also check on the designation for the CD/DVD optical drive with the lsblk command as shown below.
alice@Wonderland:~$ lsblk -o NAME,TRAN,TYPE,SIZE | grep "rom" sr0 usb rom 6.8G alice@Wonderland:~$
Since MakeMKV needs access to the DVD/Blu-ray drive, I also used
snap connections makemkv to determine if MakeMKV had access
to the optical drive. I saw it did not have access. If it doesn't have
access, you can grant it with sudo snap connect
makemkv:optical-drive. If an application needs access to discs or
output files on external drives, it also should have access to
removable-media. I also saw MakeMKV did not have access to
removeable-media. You can grant that access
with sudo snap connect makemkv:removable-media.
alice@Wonderland:~$ snap connections makemkv Interface Plug Slot Notes content[gtk-3-themes] makemkv:gtk-3-themes gtk-common-themes:gtk-3-themes - content[icon-themes] makemkv:icon-themes gtk-common-themes:icon-themes - content[sound-themes] makemkv:sound-themes gtk-common-themes:sound-themes - desktop makemkv:desktop :desktop - desktop-legacy makemkv:desktop-legacy :desktop-legacy - gsettings makemkv:gsettings :gsettings - hardware-observe makemkv:hardware-observe :hardware-observe - home makemkv:home :home - network makemkv:network :network - opengl makemkv:opengl :opengl - optical-drive makemkv:optical-drive :optical-drive - optical-drive makemkv:optical-write - - process-control makemkv:process-control - - removable-media makemkv:removable-media - - shared-memory makemkv:shared-memory :shared-memory - unity7 makemkv:unity7 :unity7 - wayland makemkv:wayland :wayland - x11 makemkv:x11 :x11 - alice@Wonderland:~$
In the output of the snap connections, if a Plug is
connected to a Slot, then access is granted. If there is a dash, then
no connection exists and there is no access.
Since MakeMKV didn't have access to the optical drive and removable media, I granted access to both.
alice@Wonderland:~$ sudo snap connect makemkv:optical-drive [sudo: authenticate] Password: alice@Wonderland:~$ sudo snap connect makemkv:removable-media alice@Wonderland:~$
After I granted access to MakeMKV, I saw the following in the output
of the sudo connections makemkv command.
alice@Wonderland:~$ snap connections makemkv Interface Plug Slot Notes content[gtk-3-themes] makemkv:gtk-3-themes gtk-common-themes:gtk-3-themes - content[icon-themes] makemkv:icon-themes gtk-common-themes:icon-themes - content[sound-themes] makemkv:sound-themes gtk-common-themes:sound-themes - desktop makemkv:desktop :desktop - desktop-legacy makemkv:desktop-legacy :desktop-legacy - gsettings makemkv:gsettings :gsettings - hardware-observe makemkv:hardware-observe :hardware-observe - home makemkv:home :home - network makemkv:network :network - opengl makemkv:opengl :opengl - optical-drive makemkv:optical-drive :optical-drive - optical-drive makemkv:optical-write - - process-control makemkv:process-control - - removable-media makemkv:removable-media :removable-media manual shared-memory makemkv:shared-memory :shared-memory - unity7 makemkv:unity7 :unity7 - wayland makemkv:wayland :wayland - x11 makemkv:x11 :x11 - alice@Wonderland:~$
There were two optical-drive lines, one where the plug was
makemkv:optical-drive and the other where it was
makemkv:optical-write. That indicated the following:
makemkv:optical-drive →
:optical-drive
makemkv:optical-write → (not connected)
They both show as "optical-drive" but the second column is the interface name, not the plug name. Both plugs:
optical-driveoptical-write…use the same optical-drive
interface, so they appear twice.
I didn't need to grant write access to the drive for MakeMKV, since it
is only used for ripping
discs, so that setting was fine. If I wanted to change it, though, I could
have used the command sudo snap connect makemkv:optical-write.
But when I reopened MakeMKV again, I saw the same error message:
Failed to get full access to drive "PIONEER BD-RW BDR-XS07U". Make sure that you either have write access to device "/dev/sr0", are member of "cdrom" group or have CAP_SYS_RAWIO enabled.
When I checked on how I might resolve the problem with ChatGPT, it said that the most likely cause of the problem was that the Snap package still lacked real device access. The recommended fix was to issue three snap commands, which I did, though the third command produced an error message. I then restarted MakeMKV, but the problem remained.
alice@Wonderland:~$ sudo snap connect makemkv:hardware-observe [sudo: authenticate] Password: alice@Wonderland:~$ sudo snap connect makemkv:process-control alice@Wonderland:~$ sudo snap connect makemkv:raw-usb error: snap "makemkv" has no plug named "raw-usb" alice@Wonderland:~$
It also suggested checking on whether the user has access to the
optical drive with ls -l /dev/sr0, which should show that the
cdrom group had access and then adding the user to the cdrom group, if
the user was not already in it, but I had already done that. It also
indicated this was a common issue with the MakeMKV Snap package.
⚠️ Snap limitation (very common with MakeMKV)
Here’s the key issue:
- MakeMKV needs low-level SCSI/raw I/O access
- Snap confinement often blocks this, even when permissions look correct
👉 This is a known limitation of Snap packages for optical disc tools.
It suggested that I should install the non-Snap version of MakeMKV, instead, with the reason for the problem listed as the following:
Snap apps run in a sandbox and:
- Cannot easily get
CAP_SYS_RAWIO- Have restricted
/devaccess- Optical drives require direct SCSI passthrough
MakeMKV relies on exactly that.
Before I uninstalled the Snap package and installed the non-Snap version of MakeMKV, I thought I should see if journalctl might provide a clue about the problem, but it did not.
alice@Wonderland:~$ sudo journalctl -u snap.makemkv* [sudo: authenticate] Password: Mar 28 20:25:32 Wonderland systemd[1]: Started snap.makemkv.hook.install-4e53b> Mar 28 20:25:38 Wonderland systemd[1]: snap.makemkv.hook.install-4e53b64a-f5ac> Mar 28 20:25:38 Wonderland systemd[1]: snap.makemkv.hook.install-4e53b64a-f5ac> Mar 29 10:38:33 Wonderland systemd[1]: Started snap.makemkv.makemkv-8aaf869a-d> Mar 29 10:38:39 Wonderland systemd[1]: snap.makemkv.makemkv-8aaf869a-d69d-4c51> Mar 29 10:38:39 Wonderland systemd[1]: snap.makemkv.makemkv-8aaf869a-d69d-4c51> alice@Wonderland:~$
I finally uninstalled the Snap package with sudo snap remove makemkv.
alice@Wonderland:~$ sudo snap remove makemkv [sudo: authenticate] Password: makemkv removed (snap data snapshot saved) alice@Wonderland:~$
I was able to successfully use the program after installing MakeMKV from source code files.
References:
Related articles: