Installing Skype on CentOS 6 64-bit [Linux]

1. Download Skype - you will need the static version.

2. Extract out the downloaded tarball somewhere appropriate on your system - I extract out under /opt and make a symlink:

cd /opt ; tar -jxvf ~/Downloads/skype_static-2.2.0.35.tar.bz2

ln -s skype_static-2.2.0.35 skype

3. Skype is a 32-bit app and as a result requires specific 32-bit libraries to be installed. Install the 32-bit dependencies for skype:

yum install gamin.i686 zlib.i686 libXinerama.i686 libXv.i686 libxcb.i686 nss-softokn-freebl.i686 libX11.i686 alsa-lib.i686 expat.i686 libXrender.i686 libICE.i686 glibc.i686 libXext.i686 libselinux.i686 freetype.i686 libXrandr.i686 libuuid.i686 libXScrnSaver.i686 fontconfig.i686 libSM.i686 libXau.i686 glib2.i686 libXi.i686 libgcc.i686 libstdc++.i686

4. Run /opt/skype/skype to start Skype up on your system.

5. (Optional) You can add a menu item by creating /usr/local/share/applications/skype.desktop with the following contents:

[Desktop Entry]

Name=Skype

Comment=Skype Internet Telephony

Exec=/opt/skype/skype

Icon=/opt/skype/icons/SkypeBlue_48x48.png

Terminal=0

Type=Application

Encoding=UTF-8

Categories=Network;Application;

UPDATE: 

Skype 4 for Linux has been released. It can be installed on CentOS 6 using the same process as above but requires the following additional steps to install extra dependencies: