There are thousands of Linux commands available to perform any task via the command line interface. It’s challenging for Linux users to remember or memorize all those commands, and it’s probably not wise to do so. In this scenario, the Linux commands cheat sheet comes in handy for Linux users. It will help them perform day-to-day tasks quickly.
Although the Linux commands cheat sheet doesn’t provide much detailed information, if you are a newbie and want to learn the Linux Terminal like a pro, you must collect these PDF files of the Linux commands cheat sheet.
Best Linux Commands Cheat Sheet
This article is a collection of Unix, FreeBSD, and Linux cheat sheets covering various categories, including basic commands, bash shell, sysadmin, security, distro-specific commands, Raspberry Pi commands, and more.
One thing I would like to mention is that all the cheat sheets that I provided here are in PDF format, and I don’t own or have created them either. Every file is collected online by Googling. I have just collected all those in one place so that Linux users don’t need to search online and get help from one place.
1. The Linux® Command Line
In today’s world, most users are familiar with the graphical user interface (GUI), and vendors and pundits say that the command-line interface is difficult and terrifying. Yes, it’s true that a GUI makes the task easy, but a command-line interface makes the difficult task possible.
If you want to regain control of your computer, there is no other way except to make a habit of using the command line interface. Though this article is all about the Linux commands cheat sheet, I would like to mention this Linux tutorial book, which teaches you both Linux command lines and offers a handful of various command line cheat sheets.
This Linux learning book consists of various sections, including learning the shell, Terminal emulator, and commands, understanding the file system directory, exploring the system, using the Linux admin cheat sheet on manipulating the files and directories, working with various Linux commands in the different shell environment, redirecting standard output and errors, learn how the shell works, advance keyboard tricks for using the command line, and much more.
This Linux cheat sheet tutorial book also provides a set of essential tools for package management, storage media, networking, archiving and backup systems, text processing, formatting output, compiling programs, etc.
Download The Linux® Command Line
**The Linux® Command Line is written by William E. Shotts, Jr. and collected from linuxcommand.org
2. Unix/Linux Command Reference – FOSSwire
This Linux cheat sheet provides not much but a handful of effective and essential Unix/Linux commands. It lets you learn some useful commands for file commands, system information, process management, compression, file permission, network, SSH, searching, etc.
Download Unix/Linux Command Reference
**FOSSwire.com originally created this Linux cheat sheet
3. Unix Toolbox
Though this command cheat sheet is named Unix Toolbox, it also covers Linux and BSD commands and tasks that are essential for any IT work or for advanced tech users.
It covers a wide range of system arenas, including process management, file system and structure, networking, SSH SCP, VPN with SSH, RSYNC, SUDO, encrypting files and partitions, SSL certificates, CVS and SVN, database, disk quota, shells, scripting, etc.
4. Cheat Sheet: Advanced Linux Commands
It’s a distro-specific Linux commands cheat sheet for Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL). If you are running a local server, LAMP, and a VM running RHEL, you can develop a web application, and this Linux cheat sheet will help you a lot.
Download Cheat Sheet: Advanced Linux Commands
5. Linux Bash Shell Cheat Sheet
It provides a basic-level command covering terminal shortcuts, file manipulation, terminal navigation, researching files, extracting, sorting, and filtering data, process management, file permission, creating or modifying a user account, flow redirection, chain commands, archiving and compressing data, etc.
Download Linux Bash Shell Cheat Sheet
6. Linux Quick Reference Guide
It’s a massive one comprising lots of effective and advanced Terminal commands like LVM commands, system boot and sysV startup sequence, file system hierarchy structure and partition, SWAP, RAID, autoFS, high and low-level package manager, file management, IO streams, Flow control, Database management, kernel management, Samba server, Tomcat, DNS management and much more.
Download Linux Quick Reference Guide
7. Set Operations in the Unix Shell
It’s a small Linux cheat sheet consisting of setting membership, equality, subset test, union, intersection, complement, cardinality, symmetric difference, Cartesian product, etc.
Download Set Operations in the Unix Shell
8. Ubuntu Cheat Sheet
It’s also a distro-specific Linux cheat sheet. The Ubuntu Cheat Sheet covers the various ways of package management, the Debian alternative system, the controlling process, logs, hardware information, recovery vector, etc.
Download the Ubuntu Cheat Sheet
9. The Unix and GNU/Linux command line
This Unix and Linux command cheat sheet is an all-in-one container that covers a lot of Terminal commands, including shells, filesystem, and file handling; standard I/O, redirections, pipes; task control and code editors, etc.
Download The Unix and GNU/Linux command line
10. Sed Stream Editor
This command sheet includes a sed command summary, command line argument summary, extensions, and address ranges.
Download Sed Stream Editor Cheat Sheet
11. Archlinux Cheat Sheet
It’s a distro-specific Arch Linux cheat sheet that provides essential terminal commands for configuration files, Pacman, Xorg configuration, and other common package management.
Download the Archlinux Cheat Sheet
12. AWK (Aho, Kernighan, and Weinberger) Cheat Sheet
This programming language cheat sheet covers Predefined Variable Summary, Command line argument summary, Statements and Functions, Time Functions, Bit Manipulations Functions, etc.
13. Bash History Cheat Sheet
This command cheat sheet helps users learn Bash history. It covers Emacs and Vi history editing keyboard shortcuts, History behavior modification via shell variables and shopt command, History expansion, and more. This cheat sheet was created by catonmat.net.
Download the Bash History Cheat Sheet
14. Bash Redirections Cheat Sheet
It only covers a handful of terminal commands on Bash Redirections.
Download Bash Redirections Cheat Sheet
15. Dan’s Cheat Sheets Documentation
This cheat sheet is one of the best and most resourceful collections of various Linux sections. You get all the Linux terminal commands with a detailed description. It was created by Dan Poirier and covers Ansible, AWS, Debian, Docker, Git, LIRC: Linux infrared remote control, MySQL with Django, Nginx, OpenSSL, Python, Raspberry Pi, reStructuredText, and much more; you can think of.
Download Dan’s Cheat Sheets Documentation
16. Debian Reference Card
If you are a Debian fanboy and want to master Debian terminal commands, then this Linux cheat sheet is for you. Debian Reference Card provides various sets of commands on Apt management, dpkg package management, important shell commands, network management and configuration, Daemons and system, etc.
Download the Debian Reference Card
17. Ed Text Editor Cheat Sheet
Ed, the original Unix text editor, cheat sheet covers Line Addressing and command summary.
Download Ed Text Editor Cheat Sheet
18. FreeBSD Command Reference
This command reference is useful if you are a FreeBSD user. It will help you master some basic FreeBSD commands, such as knowing system status and command structure, finding system documentation, acquainting yourself with files and directories, learning process management, and the X window system.
It also offers some effective commands when you use standard text editors like ‘vi’ editor, ‘ee’ editor, ‘joe’ editor, etc. It also covers the system administration, including user accounts, file system, slices and partitions, kernel modules, networking, file permission, etc.
Download the FreeBSD Command Reference
19. GNU Coreutils Cheat Sheet
GNU Coreutils Cheat Sheet provides some very useful commands for Linux sysadmin to perform tasks without much hassle.
Download the GNU Coreutils Cheat Sheet
**This Linux cheat sheet is created by catonmat.net.
20. GNU Emacs Reference Card
If you want to learn about Emacs commands on Error Recovery, The Minibuffer, Query Replace, Incremental Search, Killing and Deleting, Commands Dealing with Emacs Lisp, International Character Sets, etc, then you must download this Linux commands cheat sheet.
Download the GNU Emacs Reference Card
21. Linoxide’s Linux Commands Cheat Sheet
This Linux cheat sheet is one of the best handy tools for covering some fundamental Linux Terminal commands. It covers commands including the file system, hardware, network, users, compression/archive, file commands and transfer, disk usage, etc.
Download Linoxide’s Linux Commands Cheat Sheet
22. Linux Administrator’s Quick Reference Card
This Linux admin commands cheat sheet includes user management, NFS file sharing, printer configuration, network configuration, Redhat files in /etc/sysconfig, rebuild the kernel, samba file and printer sharing, IPtables (Netfilter), TCP and UDP protocol, GRUB commands, etc.
Download Linux Administrator’s Quick Reference Card
23. Linux/Unix Command Line Cheat Sheet
It provides a set of essential commands with a detailed description of how to do it.
Download the Linux/Unix Command Line Cheat Sheet
24. Linux Cheat Sheet
It gives general command instructions on logging on to the Linux server, copying files to and from the server, directory commands, working with modules and programs, etc.
Download the Linux Cheat Sheet
25. Linux Command Cheat Sheet by Loggly
Like any other Linux commands cheat sheet, it also covers a variety of Terminal commands, such as file management, file utilities, memory and process, file compression, scripting, disk utilities, network, and directory utilities.
Download the Linux Command Cheat Sheet
26. Linux Commands Cheat Sheet by RedHat developer
RedHat developer has created this Linux cheat sheet, which helps the developer use the Linux shortcut effectively and effortlessly.
Download the Linux Commands Cheat Sheet by the RedHat developer
27. Linux & LPIC Quick Reference Guide
This Linux admin commands cheat sheet is an all-in-one command collection that covers everything about Linux and its various elements. It covers logical volume management commands, filesystem hierarchy, Linux partition, RAID, GRUB, SQL, DNS, FTP, Samba, Apache, SSH, NAT routing, kernel management, OpenLDAP, and whatever else you can think of.
Download Linux & LPIC Quick Reference Guide
28. Linux Server Step-by-Step Configuration Guide Cheat Sheet
This book describes the Linux Server Commands Cheat Sheet in detail. It provides a solid knowledge base for Linux administrators by offering a set of commands that come in handy when required.
It covers Linux directories, services management, shell configuration, Linux profile management, desktop environment configuration, etc. Moreover, you can get a list of examples of various command usages in different circumstances.
Download Linux Server Step-by-Step Configuration Guide Cheat Sheet
29. Raspberry Pi Commands Cheat Sheet
If you are in the world of Raspberry Pi development, this simple command cheat sheet will help you learn various commands, such as the shutdown/restart command, the search command, the networking command, the terminal command, the desktop shortcut command, and much more.
Download Raspberry Pi Commands Cheat Sheet
30. Readline Emacs Editing Mode Cheat Sheet
It gives you a handful of commands on default keyboard shortcuts for Bash.
Download Readline Emacs Editing Mode Cheat Sheet
31. Readline VI Editing Mode Cheat Sheet
This cheat sheet also provides a set of useful commands for Bash using default keyboard shortcuts.
Download Readline VI Editing Mode Cheat Sheet
32. RHEL 5, 6, AND 7 – Common Admin Commands
It’s a distro-specific Linux admin cheat sheet on RedHat Enterprise Linux. It covers system basics, various system services, kernel, boot, and hardware, software management, security and identity, file system, volumes, and disk, among other topics.
Download the RHEL Admin Cheat Sheet
33. Unix/Linux Command Reference – Makeuseof
It’s a very good command cheat sheet that includes file commands, system status, compression, process management, network, file permission, SSH, searching, etc.
Download Unix/Linux Command Reference
34. Unix Command Cheat Sheets
TechRepublic has created this Unix command cheat sheet. It describes all the commands with short descriptions, examples, and explanations.
Download Unix Command Cheat Sheets
35. Unix Command
This Unix command cheat sheet is another of the best collections of various commands on access rights, change rights, compare files, compress/uncompress files, file permission management, etc.
36. Unix/Linux Cheat Sheet
It’s just another small Unix/Linux commands cheat sheet that includes navigation commands, examining files, manipulating files and directories, multi-tasking, pipe tools, and more.
Download the Unix/Linux Cheat Sheet
37. Util-Linux Cheat Sheet
This small piece of Linux cheat sheet is created by catonmat.net. It includes various utility commands with an easily understandable description.
Download Util-Linux Cheat Sheet
38. Visual Studio Code Cheat Sheet
Visual Studio Code is one of the best code editors for Linux, Windows, and MacOS. To do the task effortlessly, you may need some keyboard shortcuts. This cheat sheet provides a set of useful keyboard shortcuts for Linux that cover basic editing, rich language editing, multi-cursor and selection, display, editor management, file management, an integrated terminal, search and replace, etc.
Download Visual Studio Code Cheat Sheet
39. Kali Linux Cheat Sheet
Kali Linux is a popular Linux distro for pen testing tools and hacking learning. In the process of learning, you need to master a set of Kali Linux commands, which will ultimately save you time and resources.
In this cheat sheet, you get various commands on mount file shares, Netcat / ncat, SNMP Enumeration, DNS Enumeration and Transfer, NMAP, SMB Enumeration, HTTP Enumeration, Packet Inspection, Password Generation, etc.
Download Kali Linux Cheat Sheet
40. Linux Terminal Commands
Linux Terminal is a very powerful and useful tool. You can use various commands in the Terminal to do the task effortlessly. In this Linux Terminal command cheat sheet, you get Linux basic commands with a short description and example.
Download Linux Terminal Commands
Final Thought
Linux is created based on a robust and highly integrated command line interface. This definitely gives users more access to perform both easy and expert-level tasks. That’s why most hacking and pen testing tools are built with the Linux environment in mind.
If you want to be a master of Linux, then it’s also important to know all about command line structure. After being expertized in the Linux command line, you will be able to perform the powerful job with just a few keystrokes.
The above Linux command cheat sheets will help you remember useful Linux commands, whether you’re a beginner or an expert.
I hope you like this article. This list is an evergreen collection, and I will be adding more Linux cheat sheets in the future. If you want me to include any of the best Linux commands cheat sheets here, please send me the file through the “contact me” link.
Note: I don’t own any cheat sheets. I have tried to give proper author credit, but if I missed anything, please let me know in the comment below. I will correct it in the proper fashion.
Moreover, if an author wants me to remove or delete any PDF content from this list, send me a delete request with proof of proper authorship. I hope the author will understand that this list was created to help Linux users. Thank you.
