QEMU Grabbing Binds

Bugs / FRs / Support
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1
Hyprland version 
Hyprland 0.53.3 built from branch v0.53.3 at commit dd220efe7b1e292415bd0ea7161f63df9c95bfd3 clean (version: bump to 0.53.3).
Date: Sat Jan 24 20:02:06 2026
Tag: v0.53.3, commits: 6793

Libraries:
Hyprgraphics: built against 0.5.0, system has 0.5.0
Hyprutils: built against 0.11.0, system has 0.11.0
Hyprcursor: built against 0.1.13, system has 0.1.13
Hyprlang: built against 0.6.8, system has 0.6.8
Aquamarine: built against 0.10.0, system has 0.10.0

Version ABI string: dd220efe7b1e292415bd0ea7161f63df9c95bfd3_aq_0.10_hu_0.11_hg_0.5_hc_0.1_hlg_0.6
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This is likely very simple, but I couldn’t find the exact search terms:

QEMU/Virt Manager grabs keyboard input when I click into a VM, which is mostly correct, but I would like to pass some of my binds (switch workspace, fullscreen, etc) to Hyprland rather than QEMU.

Is there any workaround for this, or will I just need to disable QEMU keyboard handling?

Related Ancient Post

2

Have you tried using the bypass flag on your keybinds?

Flag Name Description
p bypass Bypasses the app’s requests to inhibit keybinds.

see: Binds – Hyprland Wiki

3

Here’s what I do (see also the suggestion by @nezu)

# Passthrough
# This permits directing shortcuts to a KVM VM window
bind=ALT,R,submap,passthrough
submap=passthrough
# Press ESC to exit the passthrough
bind=,escape,submap,reset
submap=reset
4

This does not work. virt-manager still grabs the binds’ input.

Not sure what your submap is supposed to do, or how it answers the OPs question.