How to Change Shutdown Message in Linux

Often system administrators need to shutdown or reboot system in order to perform upgrades or maintenance. In such times, it is convenient for all user if they are able to see a custom message about shutdown. In this article, we will learn how to change shutdown message in Linux. It helps system administrators send a warning message before they shutdown system.

How to Change Shutdown Message in Linux

As system administrators, you can schedule shutdown at a specific time using shutdown command. Here is an example to shutdown at 15:00

# shutdown 15:00

Here is the message users get when the administrator schedules a system shutdown.

Shutdown scheduled for Fri 2022-05-12 15:00:00 EAT, use 'shutdown -c' to cancel.

Broadcast message for ubuntu@fedingo (Fri 2022-05-12 15:00:00 EAT):

The system is going down for power-off at Fri 2022-05-12 15:00:00 EAT!

If you want to send a custom message to other users 2 minutes before an in line system shutdown, run the following command and customize the message as per your requirement.

# shutdown 2 The system is going down for required maintenance. Please save any important work you are doing now!

The above command will broadcast your message to other system users.

If you want to cancel the shutdown due to some unavoidable work, you can use the following command.

# shutdown -c

In this short article, we have learnt how to send custom message before shutdown so that other users can make accommodations accordingly.

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