Copy SSH private key to Termux

Termux is a beautiful terminal emulator Android app. As I am working mostly on the command line I wanted to be able to do the same on phone. And most importantly in a case of emergency where I don’t have access to my computer I want to able to access my servers and run some commands. This requires to setup existing SSH private keys in the Termux.

I haven’t found a good tutorial that explains how to do this. It’s actually very easy.

First you need to able to access your private key file from your phone. In my case I uploaded the file id_ed25519 to my private Nextcloud. On my phone I access the file and choose Termux to open the file.

Termux then shows this dialog:

You choose Open Directory. The file is saved in ~/download.

Before we move the file to the correct location. Make sure that you have installed the openssh package.

apt update && apt upgrade
pkg install openssh

This will create the ssh folder in your home directory and provide the ssh command.

You can then move the file.

Now you can access your server using the private ssh key.

Note that you cannot change the username in Termux and therefore need to provide the username on the server in the ssh command.