How to Restart a Service in Linux?

In Linux, managing system services is an essential task for maintaining the stability and performance of your system. Whether you're troubleshooting an application, applying configuration changes, or ensuring services run smoothly, knowing how to restart a service in Linux is crucial. With tools, like systemctl, restarting services is a straightforward process that can be done via the terminal.

In this guide, we’ll walk you through how to restart a service in Linux and provide insights into managing system services effectively.

Flowchart of the process

The very first step is to open the terminal and look for the service to restart. Then just fire a command to restart the service and the service will stop and start again.

Steps to Restart a Service in Linux

1. Open the terminal:

All the Linux distributions have an application menu, so just look for the terminal there and open the same. After finding the terminal, just click on the app icon to open it. In many Linux, the terminal will be at the top or bottom of the screen in the application dock.

2. Displaying the running service:

So to display the current running service just type the following command:

ls /etc/init.d

Thus, typing the above command will give you all the services that are running currently.

3. Services you want to restart:

So just select the service you want to restart, you will generally find the service you want to restart on the left side of the screen(it depends on your Linux distribution). For instance let it be "apache2"

4. Restarting your service:

So Basically at this stage, you have selected the service you want to restart. So, type the following command to restart the service:

sudo systemctl restart apache2

5. Entering Authentication Details:

Type in the password of your linux user account then as soon as you press enter the service would be restarted.

Alternative Method

So if the above method didn't work then just type the following command:

sudo systemctl stop service

Then press Enter, this will stop your service. Then enter the following command to start the service again.

sudo systemctl start service

This will start your service again.

Restarting a service in Linux is a simple yet vital task for maintaining system functionality. Using commands like systemctl restart, you can quickly manage and restart services as needed. Whether you're resolving errors or applying new configurations, mastering Linux service management is key to optimizing your system. By following this guide, you now have the tools to manage and restart services efficiently, keeping your Linux environment running smoothly.