Install the AWS Command Line Interface on Linux

Install the AWS Command Line Interface on Linux

You can install the AWS Command Line Interface and its dependencies on most Linux distributions with pip, a package manager for Python.

Important

The awscli package is available in repositories for other package managers such as APT and yum, but it is not guaranteed to be the latest version unless you get it from pip or use the bundled installer

If you already have pip, follow the instructions in the main installation topic. Run pip --version to see if your version of Linux already includes Python and pip.

$ pip --version

If you don't have pip, check to see which version of Python is installed.

$ python --version

or

$ python3 --version

If you don't have Python 2 version 2.6.5+ or Python 3 version 3.3+, install Python. Otherwise, install pip and the AWS CLI.

Sections

• Installing Pip
• Installing the AWS CLI with Pip
• Adding the AWS CLI Executable to your Command Line Path

Installing Pip

If you don't have pip, install pip with the script provided by the Python Packaging Authority.

To install pip

1. Download the installation script from pypa.io:

   $ curl -O https://bootstrap.pypa.io/get-pip.py

   The script downloads and installs the latest version of pip and another required package named setuptools.

2. Run the script with Python:

   $ python get-pip.py --user

3. Add the executable path to your PATH variable: ~/.local/bin

   To modify your PATH variable (Linux, macOS, or Unix)

   1. Find your shell's profile script in your user folder. If you are not sure which shell you have, run echo $SHELL.

      $ ls -a ~
      .  ..  .bash_logout  .bash_profile  .bashrc  Desktop  Documents  Downloads

      • Bash – .bash_profile, .profile, or .bash_login.

      • Zsh – .zshrc

      • Tcsh – .tcshrc, .cshrc or .login.

   2. Add an export command to your profile script.

      export PATH=~/.local/bin:$PATH

      This command adds a path, ~/.local/bin in this example, to the current PATH variable.

   3. Load the profile into your current session.

      $ source ~/.bash_profile

4. Verify that pip is installed correctly.

   $ pip --version
   pip 8.1.2 from ~/.local/lib/python3.4/site-packages (python 3.4)

Installing the AWS CLI with Pip

Use pip to install the AWS CLI.

$ pip install awscli --upgrade --user

Verify that the AWS CLI installed correctly.

$ aws --version
aws-cli/1.11.84 Python/3.6.2 Linux/4.4.0-59-generic botocore/1.5.47

If you get an error, see Troubleshooting AWS CLI Errors.

To upgrade to the latest version, run the installation command again:

$ pip install awscli --upgrade --user

Adding the AWS CLI Executable to your Command Line Path

After installing with pip, you may need to add the aws executable to your OS's PATH environment variable.

Example AWS CLI install location - Linux with pip (user mode)

~/.local/bin

If you didn't install in user mode, the executable might be in the bin folder of your Python installation. If you don't know where Python is installed, run which python.

$ which python
/usr/local/bin/python

The output may be the path to a symlink, not the actual executable. Run ls -al to see where it points.

$ ls -al /usr/local/bin/python
~/.local/Python/3.6/bin/python3.6

To modify your PATH variable (Linux, macOS, or Unix)

1. Find your shell's profile script in your user folder. If you are not sure which shell you have, run echo $SHELL.

   $ ls -a ~
   .  ..  .bash_logout  .bash_profile  .bashrc  Desktop  Documents  Downloads

   • Bash – .bash_profile, .profile, or .bash_login.

   • Zsh – .zshrc

   • Tcsh – .tcshrc, .cshrc or .login.

2. Add an export command to your profile script.

   export PATH=~/.local/bin:$PATH

   This command adds a path, ~/.local/bin in this example, to the current PATH variable.

3. Load the profile into your current session.

   $ source ~/.bash_profile