Su Command in Linux (Switch User)
3 min read
su (short for substitute or switch user) utility allows you to run commands with another user’s privileges, by default the root user.
su is the simplest way to switch to the administrative account in the current login session. This is especially handy when the root user is not allowed to log in to the system through ssh
or using the GUI display manager.
In this tutorial, we will explain how to use the
How to Use the
The general syntax for the
su command is as follows:
su [OPTIONS] [USER [ARGUMENT...]]
When invoked without any option, the default behavior of
su is to run an interactive shell as root:
You will be prompted to enter the root password, and if authenticated, the user running the command temporarily becomes root.
To confirm that the user is changed, use the
The command will print the name of the user running the current shell session:
The most commonly used option when invoking
--login). This makes the shell a login shell with an environment very similar to a real login and changes the current directory
If you want to run another shell instead of the one defined in the
passwd file, use the
--shell option. For example, to switch to root and to run the
zsh shell, you would type:
su -s /usr/bin/zsh
To preserve the entire environment (
LOGNAME) of the calling user, invoke the command with the
- option is used,
-p is ignored.
If you want to run a command as the substitute user without starting an interactive shell, use the
--command option. For example, to invoke the
command as root, you would type:
su -c ps
To switch to another user account, pass the user name as an argument to
su. For example, to switch to the user
tyrion you would type:
Sudo vs. Su
On some Linux distributions like Ubuntu, the root user account
is disabled by default for security reasons. This means that no password is set for root, and you cannot use
su to switch to root.
One option to change to root would be to prepend the
su command with
sudo and enter the currently logged in user password:
sudo su -
sudo command allows you to run programs as another user, by default the root user.
If the user is granted with
sudo assess, the
su command is invoked as root. Running
sudo su - and then typing the user password has the same effect the same as running
su - and typing the root password.
When used with the
sudo run an interactive login shell with the root user’s environment:
sudo -i is basically the same as running
The advantage of using
su is that the root password doesn’t need to be shared among multiple administrative user accounts.
sudo you can also allow users to run only specific programs with root privileges.
su is a command-line utility that allows you to temporarily become another user and execute commands with the substitute user.
If you have any questions or feedback, feel free to leave a comment.