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At what point during the installation of Ubuntu 18.04 do I get the option to encrypt my disk?

Somehow I missed it, so if I'll need to start over I'd like to know where to look.

Alternatively, what is a good way to encrypt after installation? I was looking at https://help.ubuntu.com/community/FullDiskEncryptionHowto but the link to CryptoRoot is broken.

Update: I had also started looking into alternatives to encrypt home folder only but I'll follow the discussion from How to Encrypt /home on Ubuntu 18.04? for that.

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2 Answers 2

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Here it is, the second option:

enter image description here

I hope you know where to look now. :~)

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    So my only option is to erase the entire disk, including Windows, if I want to have encryption in Ubuntu? In my case I have two options and if I select simply "Erase Ubuntu 18.04 LTS and reinstall" the encrypt checkbox is grayed out. Only if I select Erase disk, which it says will erase files in all operating systems, I can encrypt.
    – Bani
    Apr 28, 2018 at 21:09
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    The encrypt home folder option was removed intentionally. They want you to encrypt the full disk now, unfortunately. My home folder was on a separate partition, so I choose the "Something else" option, set up the mounts, making sure NOT to format the "/home" directory, and then set up the same username and password. Once installed, I had to install ecryptfs-utils, and reboot. Then it worked.
    – SunnyDaze
    Apr 29, 2018 at 0:31
  • @SunnyDaze - Why is encrypting the entire disk unfortunate? Secondly, why encrypt the home encrypt separately?
    – Motivated
    Dec 30, 2018 at 0:16
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    @Motivated - I would imagine if you are installing the newest Ubuntu over an older install then encrypting the entire disk would require you to format and erase all of your home folder by default, which makes it unfortunate because you get caught by surprise, and have to jump through hoops to get it working again. If it's a fresh install, then no big deal, but for me I have home folder files from 15 years ago... Encrypting your home folder in addition to entire the entire disk encryption adds a second layer of encryption, making it more secure.
    – SunnyDaze
    Mar 6, 2019 at 15:58
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It should be possible to do it when selecting "Something else" (however I have encountered some issues with this approach), so here is how it may be overcome: you need to create positions manually before entering installation (you may do it by selecting Try Ubuntu, instead of install). The easiest way is to use utility called "disks". You should already have EFI partition (a small FAT partition usually one of the first ones on disk - should have " Partition Type " set to EFI System. If you don't have one, just create 200 - 500MB FAT partition. Next you need to create 500-2048 MB Ext4 partition (for boot) , please write down the name under "Device" - like /dev/sda3. Finally create last partition with remaining space for OS (and home) as Ext4 with LUKS (for more advanced options you may refer to this guide How can I install Ubuntu encrypted with LUKS with dual-boot?) To make sure that installation will go the right way please unlock encrypted partition (partition will show up below the LUKS container) but don't mount it.

Now you can proceed with installation. When selecting Something else, you need to select your boot partition (aka /dev/sda3) and choose to format it as Ext4 with mount point set to boot. You need also to find your encrypted partition, which should be somewhere on top of the list (something like /dev/mapper/something) and choose mount point as "/". You need also make sure that the right drivr is selected for grub installation. You can select Next and proceed with installation.

Edit: it seems that encrypted partition needs to be created by installer, otherwise system won't be able to mount it and boot.

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