How to Add User to Group in Linux
Updated on Oct 2, 2020 • 4 min read
In this tutorial, we will explain how to add a user to a group in Linux systems. We will
also show you how to remove a user from a group and how to create, delete, and list
groups.
Linux Groups #
Linux groups are organization units that are used to organize and administer user
accounts in Linux. The primary purpose of groups is to define a set of privileges such
as reading, writing, or executing permission for a given resource that can be shared
among the users within the group.
There are two types of groups in Linux operating systems:
The Primary group – When a user creates a file, the file’s group is set to the user’s
primary group. Usually, the name of the group is the same as the name of the user.
The information about the user’s primary group is stored in the /etc/passwd file.
Secondary or supplementary group - Useful when you want to grant certain file
permissions to a set of users who are members of the group. For example, if you
add a specific user to the docker group, the user will inherit the group’s access
rights and be able to run docker commands.
Each user can belong to exactly one primary group and zero or more secondary
groups.
Only root or users with sudo access can add a user to a group.
How to Add an Existing User to a Group
To add an existing user to a secondary group, use the usermod -a -G command
followed the name of the group and the user:
$ sudo usermod -a -G groupname username
For example, to add the user linuxize to the sudo group, you would run the
following command:
$ sudo usermod -a -G sudo linuxize
Always use the -a (append) option when adding a user to a new group. If you omit the
-a option, the user will be removed from any groups not listed after the -G option.
On success, the usermod command does not display any output. It warns you only if
the user or group doesn’t exist.
How to Add an Existing User to Multiple Groups in One
Command
If you want to add an existing user to multiple secondary groups in one command, use
the usermod command followed by the -G option name of the group separated by ,
(commas):
$ sudo usermod -a -G group1,group2 username
How to Remove a User From a Group
To remove a user from a group, use the gpasswd command wit the -d option.
In the following example, we are removing the user username from the group
groupname :
$ sudo gpasswd -d username groupname
How to Create a Group
To create a new group , use the groupadd command followed by the group name:
$ sudo groupadd groupname
How to Delete a Group
To delete an existing group, use the groupdel command followed by the group name:
$ sudo groupdel groupname
How to Change a User’s Primary Group
To change a user primary group, use the usermod command followed by the -g
option:
$ sudo usermod -g groupname username
In the following example, we are changing the primary group of the user linuxize to
developers :
$ sudo usermod -g developers linuxize
How to Create a New User and Assign Groups in One Command
The following useradd command creates a new user named nathan with primary
group users and secondary groups wheel and developers.
$ sudo useradd -g users -G wheel,developers nathan
Display User Groups
To display complete user information, including all the groups of which a user is a
member of, use the id command followed by the username:
$ id username
If you omit the username, the command will print the information about the currently
logged-in user. Let’s check the user linuxize :
$ id linuxize
Output
uid=1000(linuxize) gid=100(users) groups=100(users),10(wheel),95(storag
From the output above, we see that the primary group of the user is users and it
belongs to wheel , storage , libvirt , docker , and kvm supplementary groups.
Use the groups command to display the user’s supplementary groups:
$ groups linuxize
Output
wheel storage power users libvirt docker kvm
If no username is passed to the groups command, it will print the currently logged in
user’s groups.
Conclusion
In this tutorial, we have shown you how to add a user to a group.
The same commands apply for any Linux distribution, including Ubuntu, CentOS, RHEL,
Debian, and Linux Mint.
Feel free to leave a comment if you have any questions.
terminal user group
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