How to reset root password on Linux Cloud Servers using Grub

So you’ve forgotten your password, but you don’t want to deploy an additional server as described in our reset root password guide, then this Grub-based method is for you!

Create an on demand backup

Before we begin changing settings on the server, let’s take an on demand backup. If something goes wrong, this will allow us to restore the server to its original state.

On the Backups page of your server, click to create an On demand backup.

Reset your server password

1. If you haven’t already done so, head over to the server’s console tab and open the console connection.

In the console window, click the Send Ctrl+Alt+Del button to send that command to the server. This will cause the server to reboot.

2. Press the Esc key continuously on your keyboard to drop into the Grub boot menu. If Esc doesn’t work, try pressing the Shift button instead. If you see the login screen, it means you’ve missed the opportunity to enter the Grub menu and will need to restart the process by clicking the Send Ctrl+Alt+Del button again.

3. When the grub menu appears, press ‘e’ to edit the grub boot commands.

4. Add init=/bin/bash to the line that starts with linux.

5. Save this change with ctrl+x on your keyboard or with F10 to allow Grub to boot with this setting. Either method will work.

Note: This setting is not saved and will be overwritten by the default grub config for the next boot.

You will be dropped into a different shell automatically. For example, root@(none):/#

6. Try to reset the root password with the passwd command:

7. If you receive an “Authentication token manipulation error”, you’ll need to remount the root partition with read and write permissions:

mount -o remount,rw /

Try the passwd command again. This time it should work.

Note: If your operating system uses SELinux in enforcing mode (typically Rocky Linux and AlmaLinux), you may also need to reset the contexts by using autorelabel after you change the password.

To do this, create the autorelabel file using this command:

touch /.autorelabel

This is not a required step, but if your password was changed successfully, and after the reboot, you still get the wrong password error, then this is likely the culprit.

8. If you had to remount the filesystem as read-write in step 7, you should now remount it as read-only to prevent filesystem corruption:

mount -o remount,ro /

9. You can now reboot the server. However, the reboot and shutdown commands will not work in this recovery environment.

Use exec /sbin/init command instead, or press the Send Ctrl+Alt+Del button in the top right-hand corner of the console window.

10. After the server reboots, you should now be able to log in with your newly set password!

Optional steps

Delete the On-demand backup we created earlier. You can do this either from the History section of your server’s Backups section.

Or via the Storage > Backups page on the dashboard.