Viewing system users in Linux
Last updated on: 2020-06-09
Authored by: Evan Benavides
This article describes how to list the users on a LinuxÂź server.
Display users and user details on Linux
Display a list of the users and user details on a Linux server by using one of the following commands:
getent passwd
or less /etc/passwd
These commands display the login name, optional encrypted password, numerical user ID, numerical group ID, user name or comment field, user home directory, and optional user command interpreter. The following is an example of the output:
rootâ0:0:root:/root:/bin/bash
binâ1:1:bin:/bin:/sbin/nologin
daemonâ2:2:daemon:/sbin:/sbin/nologin
admâ3:4:adm:/var/adm:/sbin/nologin
lpâ4:7:lp:/var/spool/lpd:/sbin/nologin
syncâ5:0:sync:/sbin:/bin/sync
shutdownâ6:0:shutdown:/sbin:/sbin/shutdown
haltâ7:0:halt:/sbin:/sbin/halt
mailâ8:12:mail:/var/spool/mail:/sbin/nologin
operatorâ11:0:operator:/root:/sbin/nologin
gamesâ12đŻgames:/usr/games:/sbin/nologin
ftpâ14:50:FTP User:/var/ftp:/sbin/nologin
nobodyâ99:99:Nobody:/:/sbin/nologin
systemd-networkâ192:192:systemd Network Management:/:/sbin/nologin
dbusâ81:81:System message bus:/:/sbin/nologin
polkitdâ999:998:User for polkitd:/:/sbin/nologin
libstoragemgmtâ998:997:daemon account for libstoragemgmt:/var/run/lsm:/sbin/nologin
abrtâ173:173::/etc/abrt:/sbin/nologin
rpcâ32:32:Rpcbind Daemon:/var/lib/rpcbind:/sbin/nologin
glusterâ997:995:GlusterFS daemons:/run/gluster:/sbin/nologin
sshdâ74:74:Privilege-separated SSH:/var/empty/sshd:/sbin/nologin
postfixâ89:89::/var/spool/postfix:/sbin/nologin
chronyâ996:993::/var/lib/chrony:/sbin/nologin
ntpâ38:38::/etc/ntp:/sbin/nologin
tcpdumpâ72:72::/:/sbin/nologin
centosâ1000:1000:Cloud User:/home/centos:/bin/bash
rackâ1001:1001::/home/rack:/bin/bash
testuserâ1002:1002::/home/testuser:/bin/bash
apacheâ48:48:Apache:/usr/share/httpd:/sbin/nologin
You can close the output of these commands by entering the q
key.
See the users currently logged in by using the following command:
w
This command output looks like the following example:
15:23:01 up 77 days, 6:51, 1 user, load average: 0.00, 0.01, 0.05
USER TTY FROM LOGIN@ IDLE JCPU PCPU WHAT
rack pts/0 dfw.secure-acces 14:54 5.00s 0.26s 0.33s sshd: rack [priv]