How can I use my webcam with Ubuntu running in VirtualBox?

This is possible, but requires a few steps to get working properly:

1. Make sure the virtual machine is not running and your webcam is not being used.
2. Bring up the main VBox window and in the details tab for your Win7 machine click USB.
3. Make sure "Enable USB Controller" is selected. Also make sure that "Enable USB 2.0 (EHCI) Controller" is selected too.
4. Click the "Add filter from device" button (the cable with the '+' icon).
5. Select your device from the list.
6. Now click OK and start your VM.

This will cause the device to show up as if it were plugged into the VM. From there, you should be able to use it or install drivers if necessary.

The same answer of @Nathan Osman , However , it required to belong to vboxusers group to be able to see all devices on adding one.

sudo usermod -a -G vboxusers $(whoami)

Logout & login again , check if your vboxusers displays in this command :

groups

Probably, you should download and install VirtualBox extension pack which will supported USB 2.0 and USB 3.0 devices.

I faced the same issue earlier and I got it solved by installing this extension pack.

1. Install the VirtualBox extension pack
2. Restart both host and guest system.

Go to Settings --> USB
select USB 2.0 (EHCI) controller
Look in Add new filters.
Now your webcam appears in the list. Add those USB Filters.

Note: My Host is Windows 10 and Virtual Os is Ubuntu 16.04

Many built-in cameras will not appear as USB devices.

In this case you need to install the VirtualBox Extension Pack and possibly the Guest Additions (not sure about it).

Then restart the VM and in the top menu Devices there should be a new submenu Webcams. Enable your webcam from there and it should become available in the VM.

What I had to do, using Ubuntu 20.04, Virtualbox 6.1.

1. Install guest additions and extension pack

$ sudo apt-get install virtualbox-guest-additions-iso virtualbox-ext-pack

2. Add the extension pack via Virtualbox itself. In principle, I guessed with step 1 this won't be necessary. But step 3 below did not find any webcam. So I decided installing this pack. Installation reported an error, but thigns worked fine anyway. Some more work would clarify if any of the two versions of the package can be removed/not installed.
   Download the extension pack file (currently 6.1.6), and add it with File -> Preferences -> Extensions -> Adds new package (look for the downloaded file). Note: I have seen mentions that this might have issues if updating VBox, and not updating the extensions. Perhaps doing it via apt-get gets rid of this issue.

3. Check if the webcam is recognized, and get its/their name/s

$ VBoxManage list webcams
Video Input Devices: 2
.1 "Integrated Camera: Integrated C"
/dev/video0
.2 "Integrated Camera: Integrated C"
/dev/video1

4. Attach webcam to VM

$ VBoxManage controlvm "Win10" webcam attach .1

Ẁin10 stands for the VM name, .1 stands for the webcam as obtained in the output of item 3.

I had my VM running, and right after I run command in item 4, the Win 10 VM detected the webcam as a USB device and automatically started installing it. After about 10 seconds of the installation process (as usual), the webcam was up and running in my Win 10 guest OS.

I followed all the steps from Rajes_Saladi. Need to do one additional step from steps mentioned:

• After booting the guest Ubuntu OS go to menu Devices -> Webcams -> {Tick the Integrated webamera option}
• Run the in built cheese application to verify weather Camera is funcional

Note: I am using integrated webcam of laptop.