diff --git a/cmake/packaging/build_linux_zip.sh b/cmake/packaging/build_linux_zip.sh
index 7496336efd..c78fe9c45f 100755
--- a/cmake/packaging/build_linux_zip.sh
+++ b/cmake/packaging/build_linux_zip.sh
@@ -45,6 +45,17 @@ do \
     cp -r  ${QTDIR}/plugins/${dir} ${DESTDIR}/qt5plugins/
 done
 
+echo "Set up wrapper script"
+MYDIR=$(dirname "$0")
+cp ${MYDIR}/linux_wrapper.sh ${DESTDIR}/bin
+for s in ${DESTDIR}/bin/*
+do \
+        EXE=$(basename $s)
+        test ${EXE} = linux_wrapper.sh && continue
+        test ${EXE} = qt.conf && continue
+        ln -s bin/linux_wrapper.sh ${DESTDIR}/${EXE}
+done
+
 pushd ..
 zip -9rv LAMMPS-Linux-amd64.zip LAMMPS_GUI
 popd
diff --git a/cmake/packaging/linux_wrapper.sh b/cmake/packaging/linux_wrapper.sh
new file mode 100755
index 0000000000..86cd50599c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/cmake/packaging/linux_wrapper.sh
@@ -0,0 +1,11 @@
+#!/bin/sh
+# wrapper for bundled executables
+
+BASEDIR=$(dirname "$0")
+EXENAME=$(basename "$0")
+
+# append to LD_LIBRARY_PATH to prefer local (newer) libs
+LD_LIBRARY_PATH=${LD_LIBRARY_PATH}:${BASEDIR}/lib
+export LD_LIBRARY_PATH
+
+exec "${BASEDIR}/bin/${EXENAME}" "$@"