1 Answer. This is totally normal. .exe files are Windows executables, and are not meant to be executed natively by any Linux system. However, there’s a program called Wine which allows you to run .exe files by translating Windows API calls to calls your Linux kernel can understand.

Can we run .exe file in Linux?

The exe file will either execute under Linux or Windows, but not both. If the file is a windows file, it will not run under Linux on it’s own. So if that’s the case, you could try running it under a Windows compatibility layer (Wine). If it’s not compatible with wine, then you won’t be able to execute it under Linux.

Why can’t Linux run Windows programs?

The difficulty is that Windows and Linux have completely different APIs: they have different kernel interfaces and sets of libraries. So to actually run a Windows application, Linux would need to emulate all the API calls that the application makes.