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100+ Linux Commands with Downloadable Cheat Sheet

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You can achieve virtually anything on a Linux operating system using a command. Whether you want to send a file to the printer, set up your system firewall, or edit a file without even opening it; you can do it all directly from the terminal.

There’re thousands of commands available on any Linux system and more handed to you whenever you install new software or packages. It’s a common misconception amongst beginners that you have to cram all of these commands in order to be considered an expert, but in reality, you only need to know a small subset of commands to become a proficient Linux administrator.

In this article, we’ll be sharing 100+ such commands across different categories along with a downloadable cheat sheet.

Basic Commands

Command

Description

ls
Show all files and directories present in the working directory
ls -l
Show all files and directories along with details like ownership, size, and when they were last modified
ls -t
Sort the output of ls by last modified date
pwd
List the path of the current working directory
cd directory
Switch to a different working directory
cd ..
Move up one directory level
cd /
Switch to the root directory
clear
Wipe out all the text from the terminal screen
history
Print out all the previously executed commands in the current session
touch filename
Create a new file
vi filename
Open a file for editing
cat filename
Display the contents of a file
hostnamectl
List system information, including kernel, release, architecture, and virtualization etc.
ifconfig
Show the network interfaces, IP addresses, and MAC address of the system
date
Print the current system date and time
top
List all the running processes on the system
free -m
Show memory usage stats
head filename
Display the first 10 lines of a file
tail filename
Display the last 10 lines of a file
mv file /new/file/path
Move the file to a different location
mv filename new_filename
Rename a file
cp filename new_filename
Copy a file
man command_name
List helpful information regarding a command
rm filename
Delete a file
rm –rf directory_name
Remove a directory and its contents
sudo
For regular users to run commands with elevated privileges
mkdir directory_name
Create a new directory
kill pid
Kill a process using its process ID
reboot
Restart the system
shutdown –h now
Turn off the system

Networking Commands

Command

Description

dig domain_name
Show the DNS related information of the given domain name
dig -x host
Perform a reverse lookup for a host
host domain_name
Perform DNS lookup of the given domain name which prints out the IP address
whois domain_name
For more information about a domain
ping ip
Check the connectivity between your host and the given IP address
ssh username@ip
To securely log in as the specified user on another server
wget file
Download a file
wget -c file
Continue a stopped download
traceroute domain_name
Trace the route a packet will take when travelling from your machine to a host
telnet domain_name port
Connect to a remote host on a specific port
netstat –pnltu
Display all currently listening ports
route
Display the routing table for your machine
arp
View the contents of the ARP (address resolution protocol) table
cat /etc/resolv.conf
See the DNS servers that your machine is currently using
tcpdump -i eth1 'port 80'
Log and monitor all incoming traffic on port 80
nmap ip
Network discovery of the given IP. Find out whether the host is up, which ports are open etc.

Command

Description

locate keyword
Search for a file or directory in a pre-compiled cache. Much faster than find but many not show all results
find keyword
Search for a file or directory in the real system. Much slower than locate but is always up-to-date
find /home -name *.ext
Search for the given extension in the /home directory and all its sub-directories
find / -type f ! -perm xxx
List all files that don’t have the specified permission
find / -perm /u=r
Display all the read-only files
grep keyword filename
Search for the specified keyword/pattern in the given file
grep keyword *
Search for the specified keyword/pattern across all files in the current directory
grep -i keyword *
To ignore case while searching
grep -r keyword *
Perform a recursive search, i.e. include the sub-directories in the search
grep -x 'what to match' *
Print all the lines where a match was found
grep -c keyword *
Count the number of matches

Permissions Commands

Command

Description

chmod xxx filename
Assign the specified permissions to a file
chmod –R xxx directory
Assign the specified permissions to a directory, and all its sub-directories
chmod –x filename
Remove the execution permissions from a file
chown username filename
Change the ownership of the specified file
chown username:groupname filename
Change the ownership and the group ownership of a file
chown username:groupname filename1 filename2 filename3
Change the ownership and the group ownership of multiple files
chown --from=bob alice filename
Change the ownership of a file only if it’s owned by a specific user (added after --from=)
chown -h usergroup symbolic_link
Forcefully change the owner and group of a symbolic link

Storage Commands

Command

Description

df –h
List storage related information of all partitions, including overall size, free space, and used space etc.
mount
unmount
Mount or unmount an ISO file or a storage device
du -h /home/directory_name
Find the directory size in a human readable format
du -sh /home/directory_name
To get the total size of a directory
du -ah --exclude='*.xxx' /home/directory_name
Display the disk usage of all files in a directory, excluding files with the given extension
du -ha --time /home/directory_name
Display disk usage of a directory by modification time
fdisk -­l
Show disk size along with partitioning information
sudo du -x / | sort -nr | head -20
List the top 20 directories that are overconsuming resources

User Management Commands

Command

Description

adduser username
Add a new user
userdel -r 'username'
Delete a user
passwd -l 'username'
Change the password of a user
whoami
See the currently logged in user
usermod -c 'This user will be deleted tomorrow' username
To add a comment to a user account
cat /etc/passwd
Display a list of all users with additional info
usermod -d /home/test username
Change the home directory of a user
sudo deluser username group_name
Remove a user from a group
usermod -a -G group_name username
Add a user to a group
groupadd group_name
Create a new group
groupdel group_name
Delete a group
id
Display the user ID, group ID, and groups for the current user

Archive Commands

Command

Description

tar -cvf archive.tar filename.txt
Compress a file into a tar archive
tar -tvf archive.tar
Display the contents of a tar archive
tar -xvf archive.tar filename.txt
Extract a single file out of a tar archive
zip archive.zip file1.txt file2.html file3.jpg
Create a zip archive using multiple files
zip -u archive.zip filename.txt
Add a file to an already zipped file
zip -d archive.zip filename.txt
Delete a file from a zip archive
unzip archive.zip
Unzip a zip archive
unzip archive.zip -d /directory_name
Unzip a zip archive to a specific directory
tar xf archive
Extract archive of any type
gzip filename
Compress a file and add the .gz extension to it. This will delete the original file
gzip -c filename > archive.gz
Create a new compressed .gz file, preserving the original

Advanced Commands

Command

Description

ps –ef | grep process_name
Check whether a specific process is running
netstat –pnltu | grep port
Check whether a specific port is open
history | grep keyword
Search for something in the history
ip r
Display the IP address of the default gateway
ssh-keygen
Generate SSH keys to allow public key based secure login
scp filename user@ip:/home/location
Securely copy a file to a remote host
find / -type f -perm 777 -print -exec chmod xxx {} \;
Find all the files that have 777 permissions, and modify them to xxx
sed -i 's/CONTENT_TO_REPLACE/CONTENT_TO_REPLACE_IT_WITH/g' filename
Replace the specified content in a file with something else
tcpdump -nnvvS src SRC_IP and dst port xxxx
Monitor all traffic emerging from a certain IP and going towards a certain port
traceroute domain_name -q 5
Send 5 packets per hop while tracing the route to the given domain name

Downloadable Cheat Sheet

Download the 2560×1440 wallpaper cheat sheet for easy reference.

Linux Commands Cheat Sheet
Download the Cheat Sheet

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The Author

Maab S.

Maab is an experienced software engineer who specializes in explaining technical topics to a wider audience.

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