Top 100 Linux Commands You MUST Know

Linux is a powerful and versatile operating system used by developers, sysadmins, and enthusiasts worldwide. Understanding key Linux commands is essential for efficient system management and getting the most out of your Linux environment. Here is a comprehensive list of the top 100 Linux commands you must know, categorized for ease of use.

Basic Commands

• ls - List directory contents.
• cd - Change the current directory.
• pwd - Print the current working directory.
• mkdir - Create a new directory.
• rmdir - Remove an empty directory.
• touch - Create an empty file or update the timestamp of an existing file.
• cp - Copy files or directories.
• mv - Move or rename files or directories.
• rm - Remove files or directories.
• cat - Concatenate and display file contents.

File Permissions

• chmod - Change file mode (permissions).
• chown - Change file owner and group.
• chgrp - Change group ownership of files or directories.
• umask - Set default file permissions.
• stat - Display file or file system status.

File Search

• find - Search for files in a directory hierarchy.
• locate - Find files by name using a prebuilt database.
• grep - Search for patterns within files.
• which - Locate a command.
• whereis - Locate the binary, source, and manual page files for a command.

File Compression

• tar - Archive files.
• gzip - Compress files.
• gunzip - Decompress files.
• bzip2 - Compress files.
• bunzip2 - Decompress files.

System Monitoring

• top - Display real-time system information and process list.
• htop - Interactive process viewer.
• ps - Report a snapshot of current processes.
• df - Report file system disk space usage.
• du - Estimate file space usage.

Network Commands

• ping - Check the network connection to a server.
• ifconfig - Display network configuration.
• netstat - Print network connections, routing tables, interface statistics, masquerade connections, and multicast memberships.
• ssh - OpenSSH remote login client.
• scp - Secure copy files over SSH.

Package Management

• apt-get - APT package handling utility.
• yum - Package manager for RPM-based distributions.
• dnf - Next generation version of yum.
• zypper - Command line interface of ZYpp package manager.
• pacman - Package manager utility (Arch Linux).

User Management

• useradd - Create a new user or update default new user information.
• usermod - Modify a user account.
• userdel - Delete a user account and related files.
• groupadd - Create a new group.
• groupmod - Modify a group definition.
• groupdel - Delete a group.

Disk Usage

• fdisk - Partition table manipulator for Linux.
• mkfs - Build a Linux file system.
• mount - Mount a file system.
• umount - Unmount file systems.
• fsck - File system consistency check and repair.

Text Processing

• awk - Pattern scanning and processing language.
• sed - Stream editor for filtering and transforming text.
• cut - Remove sections from each line of files.
• sort - Sort lines of text files.
• uniq - Report or omit repeated lines.
• tr - Translate or delete characters.

Shell Scripting

• sh - Shell, the standard command language interpreter.
• bash - GNU Bourne-Again SHell.
• echo - Display a line of text.
• read - Read a line of text from standard input.
• exit - Exit the shell.

System Information

• uname - Print system information.
• hostname - Show or set the system's host name.
• uptime - Tell how long the system has been running.
• whoami - Print effective user ID.
• id - Print real and effective user and group IDs.