How To Access Your Vultr VPS

Vultr provides several different ways to access your VPS to configure, install, and use.

Access Credentials

The default access credentials for your VPS are found on the Server Information Page that can be accessed by visiting my.vultr.com and clicking on Servers and then the name of your VPS. The IP Address for your VPS, the Username for the Root/Administrator user, and the password are listed on this page. The password can be revealed by clicking on the eye icon and it can be copied to the clipboard using the copy icon.

Note about credentials: The credentials listed are the ones that we used when the VPS was first created. This information will not update if you change the password inside of your VPS OS. Also if you create a VPS based upon a snapshot the login credentials will be those of the VPS that was used to create the snapshot instead of those listed on the Server Information Page.

Console

Vultr provides a web based Console to all VPSes. This console provides access to the VPS that is similar to sitting in front of a physical machine. This type of access is often referred to as KVM (keyboard, video, mouse) access. The console allows you to see what your VPS is doing even if it is not responding over the network. The console should be one of the first places to look for any errors if you experience any difficulties with your VPS.

The console can be accessed by visiting my.vultr.com and clicking on Servers and then the name of your VPS. In the top right there is an icon that looks like a computer monitor. Clicking this icon will launch the console.

Notes about console: The console software does not support cut & paste. You will need to key in login information directly. The software also uses the US character set. If you are using an international keyboard layout and are having trouble to key in the special characters used in passwords please switch to a US keyboard layout. Some VPN or Proxy systems will cause issues with the console. If you are having trouble to access please be sure to connect using a direct internet connection.

SSH (Linux)

All Linux VPS are configured for access via SSH. SSH (Secure SHell) is a secure way to access a text console over the network. Macintosh & Linux computers have an SSH client program installed by default. Windows does not include an SSH client, however there are many available. The most common one is PuTTY http://www.putty.org/.

To access with Linux/Mac you will need to open a command prompt. The basic syntax for SSH is ssh username@host For example if your VPS IP address was 192.168.2.1 and your user was root you would use the command ssh root@192.168.2.1

To access with Windows you would need to consult the documentation for the SSH client software that you install.

RDP (Windows)

Vultr Windows VPS are configured with Microsoft’s Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) enabled. All current versions of Windows include the Microsoft RDP client. Microsoft’s instructions for using the built-in RDP client are available at: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/17463/windows-7-connect-to-another-computer-remote-desktop-connection

Macintosh & Linux PCs do not include RDP by default. You would need to install a separate RDP client. Most Linux distributions will have a client available in their software repositories. Common clients for Mac are the Microsoft RDP client and CoRD. Common clients for Linux are rdesktop, krdc, and Remmina.

SFTP – Secure File Transfer Protocol (Linux)

Vultr Linux VPS enable SFTP (Secure FTP) by default. SFTP combines the functions of FTP with the security of SSH to provide a more secure way to transfer files. Traditional FTP does not encrypt its data which makes it insecure for use over the internet. The majority of FTP client software will support SFTP directly.

Macintosh & Linux computers include a command line text SFTP client by default. Windows does not include client software and you will need to install a separate client. One of the most popular clients is FileZilla.