Linux "localectl" Command Line Options and Examples
Control the system locale and keyboard layout settings

localectl may be used to query and change the system locale and keyboard layout settings. It communicates with systemd-localed(8) to modify files such as /etc/locale.conf and /etc/vconsole.


Usage:

localectl [OPTIONS...] {COMMAND}






Command Line Options:

--no-ask-password
Do not query the user for authentication for privileged operations.
localectl --no-ask-password ...
--no-convert
If set-keymap or set-x11-keymap is invoked and this option is passed, then the keymap will not be converted from the console toX11, or X11 to console, respectively.
localectl --no-convert ...
-H
Execute the operation remotely. Specify a hostname, or a username and hostname separated by "@", to connect to. The hostname mayoptionally be suffixed by a container name, separated by ":", which connects directly to a specific container on the specifiedhost. This will use SSH to talk to the remote machine manager instance. Container names may be enumerated with machinectl -HHOST.
localectl -H ...
-M
Execute operation on a local container. Specify a container name to connect to.
localectl -M ...
-h
Print a short help text and exit.
localectl -h ...
--version
Print a short version string and exit.
localectl --version ...
--no-pager
Do not pipe output into a pager.The following commands are understood:statusShow current settings of the system locale and keyboard mapping.set-locale LOCALE...Set the system locale. This takes one or more assignments such as "LANG=de_DE.utf8", "LC_MESSAGES=en_GB.utf8", and so on. Seelocale(7) for details on the available settings and their meanings. Use list-locales for a list of available locales (see below).list-localesList available locales useful for configuration with set-locale.set-keymap MAP [TOGGLEMAP]Set the system keyboard mapping for the console and X11. This takes a mapping name (such as "de" or "us"), and possibly a secondone to define a toggle keyboard mapping. Unless --no-convert is passed, the selected setting is also applied as the defaultsystem keyboard mapping of X11, after converting it to the closest matching X11 keyboard mapping. Use list-keymaps for a list ofavailable keyboard mappings (see below).list-keymapsList available keyboard mappings for the console, useful for configuration with set-keymap.set-x11-keymap LAYOUT [MODEL [VARIANT [OPTIONS]]]Set the system default keyboard mapping for X11 and the virtual console. This takes a keyboard mapping name (such as "de" or"us"), and possibly a model, variant, and options, see kbd(4) for details. Unless --no-convert is passed, the selected setting isalso applied as the system console keyboard mapping, after converting it to the closest matching console keyboard mapping.list-x11-keymap-models, list-x11-keymap-layouts, list-x11-keymap-variants [LAYOUT], list-x11-keymap-optionsList available X11 keymap models, layouts, variants and options, useful for configuration with set-keymap. The commandlist-x11-keymap-variants optionally takes a layout parameter to limit the output to the variants suitable for the specificlayout.EXIT STATUSOn success, 0 is returned, a non-zero failure code otherwise.ENVIRONMENT$SYSTEMD_PAGERPager to use when --no-pager is not given; overrides $PAGER. If neither $SYSTEMD_PAGER nor $PAGER are set, a set of well-knownpager implementations are tried in turn, including less(1) and more(1), until one is found. If no pager implementation isdiscovered no pager is invoked. Setting this environment variable to an empty string or the value "cat" is equivalent to passing
localectl --no-pager ...
--no-pager.
$SYSTEMD_LESSOverride the options passed to less (by default "FRSXMK").$SYSTEMD_LESSCHARSETOverride the charset passed to less (by default "utf-8", if the invoking terminal is determined to be UTF-8 compatible).
localectl --no-pager. ...