How to Get Full Privileges (Root) in Linux

The “root” account on a Linux computer is an account with full permissions. To manipulate commands on Linux, especially those that affect system files, often we need root or privileged access. With great power, unlike normal user rights, root access should be requested only when necessary. As a result, important system files can be protected from unwanted damage.

Table of Contents

Gain root access with terminal

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Open the terminal command line window interface program. If the terminal is not already on, open it. Many Linux versions allow opening the terminal by pressing Ctrl + Alt + T .

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Type . su - and press ↵ Enter . You will be logged in as an “advanced user”. You can actually use this command to log on to the computer as a regular user. However, when left blank, it will let you log in with privileges. ^{[1] X Research Source}

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Enter the preferred account password when prompted. After typing su - and pressing ↵ Enter , you will be asked to type the password for your preferred access account.

If you receive an “authentication error” message, your root account is most likely locked. Read the next section to learn how to unlock it.

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Check out the command line interpreter. When logged in with privileges, the command line interpreter will end up with # instead of $ . ^{[2] X Research Source}

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Enter a command that requires priority access. Once you’ve used su - to log in with privileges, you can run any command that requires privileged access. The su command persists until the session ends, so you don’t need to re-enter the privilege password every time you need to run the command.

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Consider using . sudo instead of su - . sudo (“super user do”) is a command that allows you to run other commands with temporary privileges. This is the best way to run a command that requires root access for most users, because at this point you don’t need a privileged access environment and the user doesn’t need to know the account password. Users will enter their usual login password to get temporary root access. ^{[3] X Research Sources}

Type sudo command and press ↵ Enter (such as sudo ifconfig ). When prompted, type your user password, do not type the preferred account password.
sudo is the preferred method with versions like Ubuntu: it works even when the root account is locked.
This command is only for users with administrative rights. Users can be added or removed from /etc/sudoers .

Unlock root account (Ubuntu)

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Unlock the root account (Ubuntu). Ubuntu (and some other versions) locks the root account to prevent normal users from accessing it. This is because when using the sudo command (see above), we rarely need privileged access. Unlocking the root account will allow you to log in with full privileges.

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Open terminal. If you are working on the desktop environment, you can press Ctrl + Alt + T to run the terminal.

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Type . sudo passwd root and press ↵ Enter . When prompted, enter your user password.

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Set a new password. You will be asked to create and enter a new password twice. Once it’s set, the root account will be active. ^{[4] X Research Sources}

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Lock the root account again. If you want to lock the root account, enter the following command to remove the password and lock the account:

sudo passwd -dl root

Log in with full control

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Consider using other methods to get temporary root access. Logging in with full control should be restricted to normal use because in doing so it is easy to execute commands that could render the system inoperable. At the same time, it also poses a security risk, especially when an SSH server is being run on the computer. Only sign in with full access when urgent repairs are needed, such as disk failure resolution or locked account recovery.

Using sudo or su instead of logging in with full access helps prevent unwanted damage during login. These commands give the user the opportunity to consider the command before serious harm is incurred.
Some versions, such as Ubuntu, lock the root account until you open it yourself. This not only prevents users from accidentally doing too much harm using the root account, but also protects the system from hackers: the root account is often their first target. When locked, hackers will not be able to gain access with the root account. You can refer to the instructions on unlocking the root account on Ubuntu in the previous section.

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Enter . root in the user field when logging into Linux. If the root account is not locked and if you know the password, you can log in with root access when asked for the usual login. Enter root in the user field when asked to log in.

If you need root access to execute a certain command, use the method above.

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Enter the root password in the user password field. After entering root in the username field, enter the root password when prompted.

In many cases, the root password can just be “password”.
If you don’t know or forget your root password, see instructions for resetting the password below.
In Ubuntu, the root account is locked and unusable until opened.

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Avoid running complicated programs while logged in as root. It is possible that by gaining root access, the program you intend to run will negatively affect the system. Instead of logging in as root, sudo and su are recommended to run the program.

Reset root password and admin password

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Reset root account password when forgotten. If you forget your root account password and user password, you will need to start your computer in recovery mode to change these passwords. If you know the user password and need to change the root account password, just type sudo passwd root , enter the user password and create a new root password.

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Restart the computer and hold down the- . ⇧ Shift left when the BIOS screen appears. The GRUB menu will be opened.