Libvirt/qemu/kvm as non-root user

Prerequisites:

A server with KVM

I'm going to use the qemu user that is created when you install KVM but you could use any user you like.

First, your user should belong to the kvm group:

grep kvm /etc/group kvm:x:36:qemu

Create a libvirtd group and add your user to it

groupadd libvirt
usermod -a -G libvirt qemu

Create a new policykit config to allow access to libvirtd using your user account via ssh

vi /etc/polkit-1/localauthority/50-local.d/50-libvirt-remote-access.pkla

Add the following content:

[Remote libvirt SSH access]
Identity=unix-group:libvirt
Identity=unix-user:qemu
Action=org.libvirt.unix.manage
ResultAny=yes
ResultInactive=yes
ResultActive=yes

Restart libvirt

service libvirtd restart