Running Cockpit

If you already have Cockpit on your server, point your web browser to: https://ip-address-of-machine:9090

Use your system user account and password to log in. See the guide for more info.

After installing Cockpit itself, consider installing additional applications in Cockpit.

Cockpit is developed with and has automated tests for:

  • Mozilla Firefox
  • Google Chrome

Cockpit is also periodically checked with:

Your current browser should work with Cockpit.
Sorry! Your current browser appears to lack necessary features.

Minimum client browser versions

The following browsers (and up) may also work with Cockpit:

  • Mozilla Firefox 82
  • Google Chrome 88
  • Microsoft Edge 88
  • Apple Safari 14.5

However, we strongly encourage you to use the latest version of your browser for security reasons.

Installation & Setup

  Tested Available  
Fedora View instructions
Red Hat Enterprise Linux View instructions
Fedora CoreOS View instructions
CentOS View instructions
Debian GNU/Linux View instructions
Arch Linux View instructions
Ubuntu View instructions
Clear Linux   View instructions
openSUSE Tumbleweed   View instructions
SUSE Linux Enterprise Micro   View instructions

“Tested” in this table means actively tested by the Cockpit team using automated integration testing with a specific virtual machine image. Distributions listed on this page likely do their own downstream testing in addition.

Fedora

Cockpit comes installed by default in Fedora Server.

To install Cockpit on other variants of Fedora use the following commands. For the latest versions use COPR.

  1. Install cockpit:
    sudo dnf install cockpit
    
  2. Enable cockpit:
    sudo systemctl enable --now cockpit.socket
    
  3. Open the firewall if necessary:
    sudo firewall-cmd --add-service=cockpit
    sudo firewall-cmd --add-service=cockpit --permanent
    

Red Hat Enterprise Linux

Cockpit is available in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 and later.

  1. On RHEL 7, enable the Extras repository.
    sudo subscription-manager repos --enable rhel-7-server-extras-rpms
    

    RHEL 8 does not need any non-default repositories.

  2. Install cockpit:
    sudo yum install cockpit
    
  3. Enable cockpit:
    sudo systemctl enable --now cockpit.socket
    
  4. On RHEL 7, or if you use non-default zones on RHEL 8, open the firewall:
    sudo firewall-cmd --add-service=cockpit
    sudo firewall-cmd --add-service=cockpit --permanent
    

Fedora CoreOS

The standard Fedora CoreOS image does not contain Cockpit packages.

  1. Install Cockpit packages as overlay RPMs:
    rpm-ostree install cockpit-system cockpit-ostree cockpit-podman
    

    Depending on your configuration, you may want to use other cockpit-* extensions as well, such as cockpit-kdump or cockpit-networkmanager.

    If you have a custom-built OSTree, simply include the same packages in your build.

  2. Reboot

Steps 1 and 2 are enough when the CoreOS machine is only connected to through another host running Cockpit.

If you want to also run a web server to log in directly on the CoreOS host:

  1. Enable password based SSH logins, unless you only use SSO logins:
    echo 'PasswordAuthentication yes' | sudo tee /etc/ssh/sshd_config.d/02-enable-passwords.conf
    sudo systemctl try-restart sshd
    
  2. Run the Cockpit web service with a privileged container (as root):
    podman container runlabel --name cockpit-ws RUN quay.io/cockpit/ws
    
  3. Make Cockpit start on boot:
    podman container runlabel INSTALL quay.io/cockpit/ws
    systemctl enable cockpit.service
    

Afterward, use a web browser to log into port 9090 on your host IP address as usual.

CentOS

Cockpit is available in CentOS 7 and later:

  1. Install cockpit:
    sudo yum install cockpit
    
  2. Enable cockpit:
    sudo systemctl enable --now cockpit.socket
    
  3. Open the firewall if necessary:
    sudo firewall-cmd --permanent --zone=public --add-service=cockpit
    sudo firewall-cmd --reload
    

Debian

These commands require a POSIX compatible shell like bash. For other shells like fish, temporarily run bash -i.

Cockpit is available in Debian since version 10 (Buster).

  1. To get the latest version, we recommend to enable the backports repository (as root):
    . /etc/os-release
    echo "deb http://deb.debian.org/debian ${VERSION_CODENAME}-backports main" > \
        /etc/apt/sources.list.d/backports.list
    apt update
    
  2. Install or update the package:
    apt install -t ${VERSION_CODENAME}-backports cockpit
    

When updating Cockpit-related packages and any dependencies, make sure to use -t ...-backports as above, so backports are included.

Ubuntu

These commands require a POSIX compatible shell like bash. For other shells like fish, temporarily run bash -i.

Cockpit is available in Ubuntu, with updated versions in official backports for LTS releases.

We recommend installing or updating the latest version from backports. This repository is enabled by default, but if you customized apt sources you might need to enable them manually.

. /etc/os-release
sudo apt install -t ${VERSION_CODENAME}-backports cockpit

When updating Cockpit-related packages and any dependencies, make sure to use -t ...-backports as above, so backports are included.

Arch Linux

Cockpit is available in Arch Linux:

sudo pacman -S cockpit
sudo systemctl enable --now cockpit.socket

If the first command fails with “database file for … does not exist”, refresh/update your system with sudo pacman -Syu first.

Clear Linux

Cockpit is in Clear Linux OS and can be installed using swupd:

sudo swupd bundle-add sysadmin-remote
sudo systemctl enable --now cockpit.socket

openSUSE Tumbleweed and Leap

Cockpit is available in both openSUSE Tumbleweed and openSUSE Leap starting by 15.6:

  1. Install cockpit:
    zypper in cockpit
    
  2. Enable cockpit:
    systemctl enable --now cockpit.socket
    
  3. Open the firewall if necessary:
    firewall-cmd --permanent --zone=public --add-service=cockpit
    firewall-cmd --reload
    
  4. Optionally allow root access (disabled by default)
    $EDITOR /etc/cockpit/disallowed-users
    

SUSE Linux Enterprise Micro

Cockpit is included in SUSE Linux Enterprise (SLE) Micro 5.x.

  1. Install cockpit (already present in the pre-built images):
    transactional-update pkg install -t pattern microos-cockpit
    
  2. Enable the socket:
    systemctl enable --now cockpit.socket
    
  3. In case you have enabled the firewall, you also must open the port:
    firewall-cmd --permanent --zone=public --add-service=cockpit
    firewall-cmd --reload
    
  4. Access through the web interface:
    https://IP_ADDRESS_OF_MACHINE:9090