[command-line] Enter export password to generate a P12 certificate

I would like to generate a P12 certificate from a .key and .pem. I'm running this command and get prompted to enter a export password:

pkcs12 -export -inkey private-key.key -in developer_identity.pem -out iphone_dev.p12

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I can't enter a password at this point, it seems that the keyboard input is not recognized.

What do I miss? (I'm new to the Command Line tool and openSSL)

This question is related to command-line passwords openssl

The answer is


The selected answer apparently does not work anymore in 2019 (at least for me).

I was trying to export a certificate using openssl (version 1.1.0) and the parameter -password doesn't work.

According to that link in the original answer (the same info is in man openssl), openssl has two parameter for passwords and they are -passin for the input parts and -passout for output files.

For the -export command, I used -passin for the password of my key file and -passout to create a new password for my P12 file.

So the complete command without any prompt was like below:

openssl pkcs12 -export -in /tmp/MyCert.crt -inkey /tmp/MyKey.key -out /tmp/MyP12.p12 -name alias -passin pass:keypassphrase -passout pass:certificatepassword

If you does not want a password, you can use pass: like below:

openssl pkcs12 -export -in /tmp/MyCert.crt -inkey /tmp/MyKey.key -out /tmp/MyP12.p12 -name alias -passin pass: -passout pass:

It will works fine with a key without password and the output certificate will be created without password too.


I know this thread has been idle for a while, but I just wanted to add my two cents to supplement jariq's comment...

Per manual, you don't necessary want to use -password option.

Let's say mykey.key has a password and your want to protect iphone-dev.p12 with another password, this is what you'd use:

pkcs12 -export -inkey mykey.key -in developer_identity.pem -out iphone_dev.p12 -passin pass:password_for_mykey -passout pass:password_for_iphone_dev

Have fun scripting!!


MacOS High Sierra is very crazy to update openssl command suddenly.

Possible in last month:

$ openssl pkcs12 -in cert.p12 -out cert.pem -nodes -clcerts
MAC verified OK

But now:

$ openssl pkcs12 -in cert.p12 -out cert.pem -nodes -clcerts -password pass:
MAC verified OK

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