Announcement: The `emulators/wine` Port arrives on OpenBSD

Date: 2026-10-18
From: Thomas Frohwein (tfrohwein)
Subject: Integration of Wine into OpenBSD ports

In what is likely the most unexpected porting project of the year, I am thrilled to announce that Wine is now available as a port. This achievement was a team effort, sparked by ongoing discussions regarding the %gs/gsbase dilemma (refer to thread [1]).

🛠️ Technical Breakthroughs

The primary obstacle was the inability to set gsbase. This was resolved through a clever software-based workaround developed by Andrii. As he explained it:

"can't set gsbase, so we are emulating %gs prefix on commands"

The bulk of the development work was carried out by Andrii and Fabien, who deserve significant credit for their efforts.

Compatibility Logic

The feasibility of this port can be expressed as a simple conditional: $\text{Compatibility} = \begin{cases} \text{Success} & \text{if Architecture} = \text{x86\_64} \\ \text{No-op} & \text{if Architecture} = \text{x86 (32-bit)} \end{cases}$

📈 Current State of Support

There has been a resurgence of interest in Wine [2]. Unlike the landscape ~~5 to 10 years ago~~, most modern Windows applications have transitioned to 64-bit architectures, making this port viable now.

Feature	Status	Note
64-bit Software	✅ Supported	Dozens of apps tested successfully
32-bit Software	❌ Unsupported	WoW64 is currently non-functional
High-end Gaming	⚠️ Partial	e.g., The Witcher 3 Remaster runs well

Gaming Performance

The recently released The Witcher 3 Remaster is operational and performs well, provided you follow the README to add vkd3d-proton.

Visual Proof:

Screenshots: See [3], [4], and [5].
Livestreams: Check [6] and [7] (Note: [7] may appear choppy due to ffmpeg recording overhead).

🔍 How to Test and Verify

If you want to try the port, you can verify if a binary is compatible using the file(1) command.

# Example output for an incompatible 32-bit binary:
file application.exe
# Output: MS-DOS executable PE for MS Windows (GUI) Intel 80386 32-bit

Recommended Testing Workflow:

Download a 64-bit application (e.g., Notepad++ v8.9.8.1).
Create a separate, non-privileged user account.
Execute the binary via the emulators/wine environment.

⚠️ Security Warning

As with all such software, this is run-at-your-own-risk [9]. Because these applications require X server access and some tests still experience hangs, we strongly advise against running them as root. We are currently investigating the use of unveil(2) to better fence in the environment.

🤝 Acknowledgments

Special thanks to the following individuals for their contributions and testing of the port draft:

brynet@
bentley@
pertho (via #openbsd-gaming on irc.libera.chat)
vl_ms

Announcement: The emulators/wine Port arrives on OpenBSD