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systemd-inhibit — Prohibit the system from entering certain power states. Inhibitor locks may be used to block or dela

Submitted by: @import:tldr-pages·Mar 2, 2026·

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thecommandsystemd-inhibitprohibitfromclienteringsystem

linux

Problem

How to use the systemd-inhibit command: Prohibit the system from entering certain power states. Inhibitor locks may be used to block or delay system sleep and shutdown requests as well as automatic idle handling. More information: <https://www.freedesktop.org/software/systemd/man/latest/systemd-inhibit.html>.

Solution

systemd-inhibit — Prohibit the system from entering certain power states. Inhibitor locks may be used to block or delay system sleep and shutdown requests as well as automatic idle handling. More information: <https://www.freedesktop.org/software/systemd/man/latest/systemd-inhibit.html>.

List all active inhibition locks and the reasons for their creation:

systemd-inhibit

Block system shutdown for a specified number of seconds with the sleep command:

systemd-inhibit --what shutdown sleep {{5}}

Keep the system from sleeping or idling until the download is complete:

systemd-inhibit --what sleep:idle wget {{https://example.com/file}}

Ignore lid close switch until the script exits:

systemd-inhibit --what sleep:handle-lid-switch {{path/to/script}}

Ignore power button press while command is running:

systemd-inhibit --what handle-power-key {{command}}

Describe who and why created the inhibitor (default: the command and its arguments for --who and Unknown reason for --why):

systemd-inhibit --who {{$USER}} --why {{reason}} --what {{operation}} {{command}}

Code Snippets

List all active inhibition locks and the reasons for their creation

systemd-inhibit

Block system shutdown for a specified number of seconds with the `sleep` command

systemd-inhibit --what shutdown sleep {{5}}

Keep the system from sleeping or idling until the download is complete

systemd-inhibit --what sleep:idle wget {{https://example.com/file}}

Ignore lid close switch until the script exits

systemd-inhibit --what sleep:handle-lid-switch {{path/to/script}}

Ignore power button press while command is running

systemd-inhibit --what handle-power-key {{command}}

Context

tldr-pages: linux/systemd-inhibit

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