This article will show you eleven useful ways to find the information about users on a Linux system. Here we’ll describe commands to get a user’s account details, show login details as well as what users are doing on the system.

Read Also: How to Monitor Linux Commands Executed by System Users in Real-time

If you want to add users in Linux, use the useradd utility, and to modify or change any attributes of a already created user account, use the usermod via the command line as explained in the following guides:

We’ll start by looking at commands to find a user’s account information, then proceed to explain commands to view login details.

1. id Command

id is a simple command line utility for displaying a real and effective user and group IDs as follows.

$ id tecmint uid=1000(tecmint) gid=1000(tecmint) groups=1000(tecmint),4(adm),24(cdrom),27(sudo),30(dip),46(plugdev),113(lpadmin),130(sambashare)

2. groups Command

groups command is used to show all the groups a user belongs to like this.

$ groups tecmint tecmint : tecmint adm cdrom sudo dip plugdev lpadmin sambashare

3. finger Command

finger command is used to search information about a user on Linux. It doesn’t come per-installed on many Linux systems.

To install it on your system, run this command on the terminal.

$ sudo apt install finger #Debian/Ubuntu $ sudo yum install finger #RHEL/CentOS $ sudo dnf install finger #Fedora 22+

It shows a user’s real name; home directory; shell; login: name, time; and so much more as below.

$ finger tecmint Login: tecmint Name: TecMint Directory: /home/tecmint Shell: /bin/bash On since Fri Sep 22 10:39 (IST) on tty8 from :0 2 hours 1 minute idle No mail. No Plan.

4. getent Command

getent is a command line utility for fetching entries from Name Service Switch (NSS) libraries from a specific system database.

To get a user’s account details, use the passwd database and the username as follows.

$ getent passwd tecmint tecmint:x:1000:1000:TecMint,,,:/home/tecmint:/bin/bash

5. grep Command

grep command is a powerful pattern searching tool available on most if not all Linus systems. You can use it to find information about a specific user from the system accounts file: /etc/passwd as shown below.

$ grep -i tecmint /etc/passwd tecmint:x:1000:1000:TecMint,,,:/home/tecmint:/bin/bash

6. lslogins Command

lslogins command shows information about known users in the system, the -u flag only displays user accounts.

$ lslogins -u UID USER PROC PWD-LOCK PWD-DENY LAST-LOGIN GECOS 0 root 144 root 1000 tecmint 70 10:39:07 TecMint,,, 1001 aaronkilik 0 1002 john 0 John Doo

7. users Command

users command shows the usernames of all users currently logged on the system like so.

$ users tecmint aaron

8. who Command

who command is used to display users who are logged on the system, including the terminals they are connecting from.

$ who -u tecmint tty8 2017-09-22 10:39 02:09 2067 (:0)

9. w Command

w command shows all users who are logged on the system and what they are doing.

$ w 12:46:54 up 2:10, 1 user, load average: 0.34, 0.44, 0.57 USER TTY FROM [email protected] IDLE JCPU PCPU WHAT tecmint tty8 :0 10:39 2:10m 4:43 0.46s cinnamon-sessio

10. last or lastb commands

last/lastb commands displays a list of last logged in users on the system.

$ last OR $ last -a #show hostname on the last column

List of Last Logged Users

tecmint tty8 Fri Sep 22 10:39 gone - no logout :0 reboot system boot Fri Sep 22 10:36 still running 4.4.0-21-generic tecmint tty8 Thu Sep 21 10:44 - down (06:56) :0 reboot system boot Thu Sep 21 10:42 - 17:40 (06:58) 4.4.0-21-generic tecmint tty8 Wed Sep 20 10:19 - down (06:50) :0 reboot system boot Wed Sep 20 10:17 - 17:10 (06:52) 4.4.0-21-generic tecmint pts/14 Tue Sep 19 15:15 - 15:16 (00:00) tmux(14160).%146 tecmint pts/13 Tue Sep 19 15:15 - 15:16 (00:00) tmux(14160).%145 ...

To show all the users who were present at a specified time, use the -p option as follows.

$ last -ap now tecmint tty8 Fri Sep 22 10:39 gone - no logout :0 reboot system boot Fri Sep 22 10:36 still running 4.4.0-21-generic wtmp begins Fri Sep 1 16:23:02 2017

11. lastlog Command

lastlog command is used to find the details of a recent login of all users or of a given user as follows.

$ lastlog OR $ lastlog -u tecmint #show lastlog records for specific user tecmint

Records of Recent Logged Users

Username Port From Latest root **Never logged in** kernoops **Never logged in** pulse **Never logged in** rtkit **Never logged in** saned **Never logged in** usbmux **Never logged in** mdm **Never logged in** tecmint pts/1 127.0.0.1 Fri Jan 6 16:50:22 +0530 2017 ..

That’s it! If you know any other command-line trick or command to view user account details do share with us.

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In this article, we’ve explained various ways to find information about users and login details on a Linux system. You can ask any questions or share your thoughts via the feedback form below.