Enable Remote Root SSH Login

If you’re running Linux devices like Raspberry Pis or VMs at home then managing them is easier if you can SSH into them as the root user. Though this is not always allowed by default.

Open the SSH config file

nano /etc/ssh/sshd_config

Find and update the following lines

PermitRootLogin yes
PasswordAuthentication yes

Restart SSH service

systemctl restart ssh

This will allow root access using a username and password, however an easier and more secure method is to use SSH keys.

If you’re on Windows you can find your public key at C:\Users\YourUsername.ssh\id_rsa.pub. Open the key file with notepad (or equivlent). If no public key exists you can create one with.

ssh-keygen -t ed25519 -C "[email protected]"

Log into your remote environment and create a new SSH folder.

mkdir -p /root/.ssh && chmod 700 /root/.ssh

Add your public key to the authorised keys. Paste the public key here.

nano /root/.ssh/authorized_keys

Set permissions.

chmod 600 /root/.ssh/authorized_keys

Enable public key authentication in /etc/ssh/sshd_config by setting the following permission.

PubkeyAuthentication yes

Restart SSH.

systemctl restart ssh