W Command in Linux Terminal with Examples

In this article we are going to shows how to use w command in Linux Terminal. If you want to learn about w command in Linux with Examples then this post is ideal for you.

The command w is a command-line utility that is used to prints the information about currently logged in users and what user is currently doing. It is also display the information about your system that how long the system has been running, current time and the system load average.

Linux is an operating system, like Windows OS, iOS, and Mac OS. It is one of the most popular operating system on the planet, Android is also powered by Linux OS(operating system).

Linux OS(operating system) is also distributed under an open source license. Open source following these points :

• Freely to run the program, for any purpose.
• Free to study how the program works.
• Freely to re-distribute copies so you can help your friends.
• Free to distribute copies of your modified versions to others.

How to Use w command in Linux

In the Linux, the basic syntax of the w command is show as below:

w [OPTIONS] [USER]

When you run the w command without any option then it will print the output as below:

$ w

Output
20:13:07 up 10 days, 08:10,  2 users,  load average: 0.08, 0.22, 0.09
USER      TTY      FROM           LOGIN@   IDLE   JCPU   PCPU   WHAT
root      pts/0    101.101.10.2   15:59    1.00s  0.02s  0.00s  w
studies   pts/1    101.101.10.9   16:14    5.00s  0.00s  0.00s  bash

Here,

• 20:13:07 – Current system time.
• up 10 days, 08:10 – Length of time in which the system has been up.
• 2 users – The number of logged-in users.
• load average: 0.08, 0.22, 0.09 – System load averages for the past 1, 5, and 15 minutes.
• USER – Name of the logged in user.
• TTY – Name of the terminal used by the user.
• FROM – Display the host name or IP address .
• LOGIN@ – Time when the user logged in.
• IDLE – Time since the user last interacted with the terminal.
• JCPU – Shows the time used by all processes attached to the tty.
• PCPU – Displaying the time used by the user’s current process.
• WHAT – User’s current process and options/arguments.

If you use one or more user names as arguments with the w command then the output is restricted to the given users:

$ w studies

Output
20:25:10 up 10 days, 08:25,  2 users,  load average: 0.00, 0.05, 0.10
USER     TTY     FROM            LOGIN@   IDLE    JCPU   PCPU  WHAT
studies  pts/1   101.101.10.9    16:14    17:35   0.00s  0.00s bash

w Command Options

Use -h, --no-header option if you don’t want to print the header in the output:

$ w -h

Outpput
root      pts/0    101.101.10.2   15:59    2.00s  0.02s  0.00s  w -h
studies   pts/1    101.101.10.9   16:14    4.00s  0.00s  0.00s  bash

Use the -f, --from option to toggles the FROM field by running below command:

$ w -f

Output
20:30:12 up 10 days, 08:40,  2 users,  load average: 0.08, 0.02, 0.00
USER      TTY      LOGIN@   IDLE   JCPU   PCPU   WHAT
root      pts/0    15:59    3.00s  0.02s  0.00s  bash
studies   pts/1    16:14    7.00s  0.00s  0.00s  w -f

Use the -o, --old-style option to use the old style output. When you run the w command with this option, the command show blank space when IDLE, JCPU, and PCPU times are less than one minute.

$ w -o

Output
20:37:13 up 10 days, 08:45,  2 users,  load average: 0.18, 0.02, 0.03
USER      TTY      FROM           LOGIN@   IDLE   JCPU   PCPU   WHAT
root      pts/0    101.101.10.2   15:59    1:37m                bash
studies   pts/1    101.101.10.9   16:14                         w -o

Use -s, --short option if you don’t want to print LOGIN@, JCPU, and PCPU fields:

$ w -s

Output
20:40:13 up 10 days, 08:48,  2 users,  load average: 0.05, 0.03, 0.00
USER      TTY      FROM              IDLE      WHAT
root      pts/0    101.101.10.2      2:20      base
studies   pts/1    101.101.10.9      3:07      w -s

Use -i, --ip-addr option to always show IP address instead of hostname in the FROM field:

$ w -i

That’s all

If you face any error and issue in above steps , please use comment box below to report.