If you have qemu installed (or in the SDK), you can start the image with: cd path/to/image ./flatcar_production_pxe.sh -curses If you need to use a different ssh key or different ssh port: ./flatcar_production_pxe.sh -a ~/.ssh/authorized_keys -p 2223 -- -curses If you rather you can use the -nographic option instad of -curses. In this mode you can switch from the vm to the qemu monitor console with: Ctrl-a c See the qemu man page for more details on the monitor console. SSH into that host with: ssh 127.0.0.1 -p 2222 You can pass extra kernel parameters with -append, for example: ./flatcar_production_pxe.sh -curses -append 'sshkey="PUT AN SSH KEY HERE"' When using -nographic or -serial you must also enable the serial console: ./flatcar_production_pxe.sh -nographic -append 'console=ttyS0,115200n8'