Create Multiple User Accounts in Linux

Adding a single new user to a Linux system can be achieved through the useradd command. But system admins often get request to add many users. So Linux provides a different to do a bulk addition of many users to a system.This is the newusers command.

Synatx

sudo newusers user_deatils.txt
user_details.txt is the file containing the details of all the usernames to be added.

User Details

Below we see the structure of user_details.txt file.

UserName:Password:UID:GID:comments:HomeDirectory:UserShell

So we create a file with below details to add many usres.

~$ cat MoreUsers.txt
uname1:pwd#@1:2112:3421:storefront:/home/uname1:/bin/bash
uname3:pwd#!@3:2112:3525:backend:/home/uname3:/bin/bash
uname4:pwd#$$9:9002:4721:HR:/home/uname4:/bin/bash

Giving Permissions to the User Details File

Before we sue the user details file to add new users, we should give permission to it to be read by other processes.

sudo chmod 0600 MoreUsers.txt

Lets verify the existing users in the system by going to the /etc/passwd file.

ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ tail -5 /etc/passwd

Running the above code gives us the following result −

pulse:x:117:124:PulseAudio daemon,,,:/var/run/pulse:/bin/false
rtkit:x:118:126:RealtimeKit,,,:/proc:/bin/false
saned:x:119:127::/var/lib/saned:/bin/false
usbmux:x:120:46:usbmux daemon,,,:/var/lib/usbmux:/bin/false
ubuntu:x:1000:1000:ubuntu16LTS,,,:/home/ubuntu:/bin/bash

Run newusers Command

next we run the newusers command to add these usernames.

sudo newusers MoreUsers.txt

Verify Added Users

Now we verify that indeed those users are added , by going again to the /etc/passwd file.

cat /etc/passwd

Running the above code gives us the following result −

………..
………….
ubuntu:x:1000:1000:ubuntu16LTS,,,:/home/ubuntu:/bin/bash
uname1:x:2112:3421:storefront:/home/uname1:/bin/bash
uname3:x:2112:3525:backend:/home/uname3:/bin/bash
uname4:x:9002:4721:HR:/home/uname4:/bin/bash