How to Open Terminal as Root User on Kali Linux

On Linux, the super user (or root) account is the account that has access to all Terminal commands as well as files on the system. Advanced users can change their Linux system at will. On most Linux distributions (including the most recent versions of Kali Linux), the super user account has been disabled. This is to prevent users from accidentally damaging the system. However, you can easily unlock a super user account on Kali Linux through Terminal. Warning: you need to be careful when logging in as a super user because fatal mistakes can cause permanent damage to the operating system . Log in with the root user account only when you know what you’re doing. ^{[1] X Research Source}

Table of Contents

Steps

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Login to Kali Linux. Proceed to login Kali Linux with your username and password. You should be able to login as a super user after setting a password for the root account.

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Press Ctrl + Alt + T to open Terminal. On most Linux distributions, you can open Terminal by clicking the Terminal icon in the Apps menu. The program has a black screen icon with a white pointer. You can also use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl + Alt + T to open Terminal.

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Type sudo apt update and press ↵ Enter . This command will update the package manager on Kali Linux.

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Type sudo apt install kali-root-login and then press ↵ Enter . This command is intended to install the premium account login package for Kali Linux (if not already available). ^{[2] X Research Source}

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Type sudo -i and press ↵ Enter . This command will grant super account access to the current user on Terminal. ^{[3] X Research Sources}

If the administrator has blocked senior access, you will not be able to manually grant this account access on Terminal.

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Enter the user password and press ↵ Enter . You need to enter the user password to switch to premium access. If successful, the command prompt on Terminal will change to “root@computername:~#” instead of “username@computername:~$” as usual. Where, “computername” is the actual name of the computer, and “username” is the current user name.

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Type passwd root then press ↵ Enter . The computer will then prompt you to enter a new password for the super user account.

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Enter the new password and press ↵ Enter . This is the password that you will use to log into the root account.

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Retype the password and press ↵ Enter . Make sure you enter the correct password you just set. This step is to confirm the new top level password. If the password is correct, the next line of text will notify that the password has been updated successfully.

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Log out of the current user account. To proceed, click on the circle icon with the arrow pointing to the right located in the upper right corner. Here you can click Log Out or Switch User .

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Sign in to a premium account. To log in to a premium account, you need to enter “root” in the username field on the login screen. Then enter the password you set for the premium account and click Log In or press Enter . So the premium account will be logged in. ^{[4] X Research Sources}

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Press Ctrl + Alt + T to open Terminal. You can check if you are logged in as a super user by opening Terminal. As the root user, the text cursor on Terminal will display as “root@computername:~#” by default (where, “computername” is the actual name of the computer). Now after logging in as root, you will be able to access all the commands for the advanced users on Terminal.

Warning

Use caution when operating as an advanced user. You can completely accidentally delete important files in the system or execute some important command causing permanent damage to the operating system.

Steps

Warning

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