Introduction: How to Interact With Your Raspberry Pi Via SSH

In this instructable, I will show you another Raspberry Pi tutorial: How to interact with your Raspberry Pi via an SSH connection with your computer. In case you do not know what an SSH connection is, a SSH, or secure shell connection, is when you use a special program and the internet to interface with your Pi's command line interface.

This is a useful tool to copy and paste command line commands when they are too long to easily type on to your Raspberry Pi.

Let's get started!

Step 1: Bill of Materials

  1. Raspberry Pi (any model)
  2. 5v charging power source
  3. HDMI cable
  4. HDMI Monitor
  5. Ethernet or WIFI access
  6. SD or MicroSD card

These are the materials needed to use an SSH connection with the Raspberry Pi, but other single-board computers can be used, such as the Orange and Banana Pi.

Step 2: Tools

The only tool you will need for this project is a computer with ethernet or wifi capabilities.

Step 3: Download Putty (SSH Client)

In order to follow this project, you will need to download a SSH client. A good one that I often use is called Putty.

I have included the link: www.putty.com

Once you have downloaded the program, install it and open it up.

Step 4: Get Your Pi's IP Address.

Get your Pi set up and attach necessary peripherals ex. monitor, keyboard,, then boot it up.

Log in to the graphical user interface, then connect it to the internet. Hover your mouse over the internet symbol (A picture of computers on the Raspberry Pi). It should then show a long string of numbers. That is your IP address.

Once you have it, enter it into the putty interface. A dialog should pop up.

It will ask : login as:. Type "pi" (all lowercase) and press enter. Then, it will ask for the password. Type in "raspberry" (all lowercase) or your set password. That is where you enter commands to the command line!

Thanks for reading my tutorial. I hope you enjoyed it. Make sure to vote for me in the Microcontroller contest!