How to Safely Shut Down or Reboot Your Raspberry Pi

Nov 19, 2020

3 minutes

Like any computer, simply pulling the plug on your Pi can have dire consequences; but unlike most computers, the Raspberry Pi does not have a native power button. The following commands should be used to safely shut down or reboot your Pi. Obviously, these commands should be run from the command line. Note: You must have sudo privileges to run sudo commands. The default raspberry pi user has such privileges so this shouldn't be an issue unless you've drastically altered your Pi's user configuration.

Raspberry Pi

Howchoo is reader-supported. As an Amazon Associate, we may earn a small affiliate commission at no cost to you when you buy through our links.

sudo halt

This is shorthand for the following:

sudo shutdown -h now

An explanation:

sudo - run the command as superuser
shutdown - shut down the pi
-h - halt after shutting down (do not reboot)
now - do this now (required time command)

sudo reboot

This is shorthand for the following:

sudo shutdown -r now

An explanation:

sudo - run the command as superuser
shutdown - shut down the pi
-r - reboot the pi after shutting down
now - do this now (required time command)

You can also safely shut down the Pi by adding a Pi power button!

NEXT UP

Ash (362)

Apr 6, 2021

Learning how to navigate your Raspberry Pi can be tricky—but it doesn't have to be! We've comprised a list of the most common Raspberry Pi commands. Not sure where to start?

Don't Pull the Plug: How to Safely Shut Down or Reboot Your Raspberry Pi

Shutdown command

Reboot command

Using a power button