Recalbox ships with an SSH server: from any computer on your network, you can open a terminal with root privileges on your Recalbox. It is the entry point for most of the advanced procedures on this wiki.
Never expose your Recalbox to the Internet, especially port 22. The default root password is public knowledge: a Recalbox reachable from outside will be compromised.
| Host | recalbox (Windows), recalbox.local (macOS, Linux, Android, iOS), or the IP address |
| Port | 22 |
| User | root (always) |
| Password | recalboxroot by default |
To find your Recalbox's IP address: START → NETWORK SETTINGS, IP ADDRESS line.
If you set a password while flashing with Raspberry Pi Imager (Recalbox 10.0 and above), use that one rather than
recalboxroot. Likewise, if you changed the machine'sHOSTNAME, use that name instead ofrecalbox.
Open PowerShell (or Windows Terminal) and type:
ssh root@recalbox
You can also use a graphical client: PuTTY or MobaXterm.
Open Terminal (Applications → Utilities):
ssh root@recalbox.local
Open a terminal:
ssh root@recalbox.local
On the first connection, your client asks you to accept the server fingerprint: answer yes.
Looking to copy files instead? See Accessing Recalbox from your computer (SFTP/SSH).
With a keyboard plugged into the Recalbox:
ALT + F2 opens a terminal in the background (it is not visible right away);ALT + F4 quits the interface and shows the terminal.The credentials are the same as above.
The right method — the one that survives updates — goes through recalbox.conf:
On your computer, generate the hash of your password:
openssl passwd -1 your_password
In recalbox.conf, set the result:
system.default_password=$1$xxxxxxxx$yyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy
Reboot: the new password applies to SSH and to the Samba network share.
The
passwdcommand works too, but the change is lost on the next Recalbox update: the password is regenerated at every boot fromrecalbox.conf.
Drop your public key into /recalbox/share/system/.ssh/authorized_keys — reachable from the network share, system folder. One key per line, as on any Linux server.
If you never use SSH, turn it off in recalbox.conf:
system.ssh.enabled=0