Q. How do I logout Linux user?
A. root or admin user can logout any user forcefully. If you are logged in as vivek and just wanted to logout or logoff, type logout command or hit CTRL+D:
$ logout
You will be logout of a login shell session or secure shell session.
Task: Linux logout user
If you would like to logout other users, you must login as root user. Next you need to use pkill command.
pkill command syntax
pkill -KILL -u {username}
To see list of logged in user type who or w command:
# who
OR
# w
To logout user called raj, enter:
# pkill -KILL -u raj
OR
$ sudo pkill -KILL -u raj
For more information read our article - Howto: Linux kill and logout users
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{ 15 comments… read them below or add one }
Thankssssss man !
Its one of things i hardly ever remember, never mind that i take the effort to write it down, but if you do need it a post like this is worth a million…
thanks
Works in OpenBSD 4.5 also. Great tip.
Whow, thanks for this posting! Just what I needed, highly appreciated!
Thanks, I was looking for such a command
i want to show the login time and logout time of all users then i will sort it according to their name help me pls…
Thanks a lot!
pkill worked fine in the GUI session!
Regards;
Thanks a lot.
I found here very usefull information about my quistions.
Best regards.
what’s the KILL flag do?
thanks, it works me to kill my locked sessions in a server
Hey, Thanks… This is exactly i requried.
Thanks you buddy….I have seen some of your posts regarding Linux commands. They are very useful for beginners like me.
if i logged twice from putty as same user root then if i want to logout one root user then how i would do it.As same user logged twice then in that case if i kill process of root -user then both will get kill…so is their is any ip based parameter to logout one root ?
Mark! do the work!
Wow. What bad information. Lets say you have root logged in under two sessions.
pkill -KILL -u root
That kills all processes owned by root. Meaning most system processes.
Let’s say you have one user in multiple sessions and that user is not root. Well, you just killed both sessions, even if that’s not what you wanted.
This is terrible advice, and the article should be called “Linux Kill All Processes by User”, and have nothing to do with “logging off”.