Connect to Amazon EC2 file directory using Filezilla and SFTP

Question

I have created an AWS EC2 Instance and I want to be able to upload files to the server directory using FileZilla in the simplest and most straightforward fashion possible

User · Answer

First of all Filezilla is an FTP SFTP client server  We will need to use the client for this purpose   1  Download the client from the URL  https   filezilla-project org   2  Go to AWS management console and then EC2  Select the instance that you want to access and then copy the DNS or IP address of the instance and then paste it in Filezilla host name   Follow Image  Amazon Instance Access via FileZilla  3  Then  enter the username for the instance that you have created  For Amazon-ami it will be ec2-user and for other OS it would be different  Then  enter the password and port which will be 21 or 22   4  Then  it will ask for the key  which is in pem format just select the  pem file and then it will confirm authentication  Click on Yes and then you are Done   Note  In your EC2 Security group allow port number 21 and 22 whichever required for FTP access

User · Answer

If you are comfortable using command lines  and use git bash to ssh to remote server  ubuntu  etc  from your PC  you may use sftp as below  works great always  and seems very fast  The pem file can be downloaded from aws EC2 or Lightsail  or any server  In the below command replace the path namd of the pem file  Also replace the IP address to that of remote server  say remote Unix or linux ubuntu server     sftp -i  c Users pat Downloads LightsailDefaultKey-us-east-1-2 pem ubuntu 123 45 6789 Additional commands for actual upload download using sftp Go to remote folder sftp gt  pwd sftp gt  cd  home ubuntu mymedia Go to local folder sftp gt  lpwd Local working directory    sftp gt  lcd  c Users pat Desktop Camtasia To upload local files to server sftp gt  put   Or use get if you need to download to your local PC sftp gt  get   Note  this is similar to the ssh to connect to remote using pem file    ssh -i  c Users pat Downloads LightsailDefaultKey-us-east-1-2 pem ubuntu 123 45 6789 Thanks

User · Answer

FileZilla did not work for me  I kept getting this error   Disconnected  No supported authentication methods available  server sent  publickey    What did work was the sftp command   Connect with the EC2 Instance with  sftp -i  path to key pem  ec2-user ec2-54-212-34-84 us-west-2 compute amazonaws com   Downloading files   dirs  To download path to source file txt and path to source dir   lcd   Desktop cd path to source get file txt get -r dir   Uploading files   dirs  To upload localpath to source file txt and   localpath to source dir to remotepath to dest   lcd localpath to source cd remotepath to dest put file txt put -r dir

User · Answer

I ve created a video tutorial for this  Just check    Connect to Amazon EC2 file directory using FileZilla and SFTP  Video Tutorial  Summary of above video tutorial     Edit  Preferences    Settings   Connection   SFTP  Click  Add key file     Browse to the location of your  pem file and select it   A message box will appear asking your permission to convert the file into ppk format  Click Yes  then give the file a name and store it somewhere   If the new file is shown in the list of Keyfiles  then continue to the next step  If not  then click  Add keyfile     and select the converted file   File   Site Manager Add a new site with the following parameters    Host  Your public DNS name of your EC2 instance  or the public IP address of the server   Protocol  SFTP   Logon Type  Normal   User  From the docs    For Amazon Linux  the default user name is ec2-user  For RHEL5  the user name is often root but might be ec2-user  For Ubuntu  the user name is ubuntu  For SUSE Linux  the user name is root  For Debian  the user name is admin  Otherwise  check with your AMI provider    Press Connect Button - If saving of passwords has been disabled  you will be prompted that the logon type will be changed to  Ask for password    Say  OK  and when connecting  at the password prompt push  OK  without entering a password to proceed past the dialog     Note   FileZilla automatically figures out which key to use  You do not need to specify the key after importing it as described above    If you use Cyberduck follow this   Check this post if you have any permission issues

User · Answer

all you have to do is   1  open site manager on filezilla   2  add new site  3  give host address and port if port is not default port  4  communnication type  SFTP  5  session type key file  6  put username  7  choose key file directory but beware on windows file explorer looks for ppk file as default choose all files on dropdown then choose your pem file and you are good to go   since you add new site and configured next time when you want to connect just choose your saved site and connect  That is it

User · Answer

If anyone is following all the steps and having no success  make sure that you are using the correct user  I was attempting to use  ec2-user  but I needed to use  ubuntu

User · Answer

Just one minor note to the well explained accepted answer of  Yasitha Chinthaka      Note  FileZilla automatically figures out which key to use  You do not   need to specify the key after importing it as described above    In my case I already had other 5 ppks from other instances that I was using in the past  with the ppk of the new instance being at the bottom of that list   I added the new ppk of my new instance  and it wouldn t let me connect to it  The error message  too many tries   attempts   After I deleted the unused ppks  I was finally able to login to the instance   So no  Filezilla is not that smart  -

User · Answer

In my case  Filezilla sends the AWS ppk file to every other FTP server I try to securely connect to    That s crazy  There s a workaround as written below but it s ugly   It does not behave well as  Lucio M pointed out   From this discussion  https   forum filezilla-project org viewtopic php t 30605  n0lqu      Agreed  However  given I can t control the operation of the server  is there any way to specify within FileZilla that a site should authenticate with a password rather than key  or vice-versa  Or tell it to try password first  then key only if password fails  It appears to me it s trying key first  and then not getting a chance to try password    botg Filezilla admin  replied      There s no such option    n0lqu      Could such an option be added  or are there any good workarounds anyone can recommend  Right now  the only workaround I know is to delete the key from general preferences  add it back only when connecting to the specific site that requires it  then deleting it again when done so it doesn t mess up other sites    botg      Right now you could have two FileZilla instances with separate config dirs  e  g  one installed and one portable     timboskratch      I just had this same issue today and managed to resolve it by changing the  logon type  of the connection using a password in the site manager  Instead of  Normal  I could select either  Interactive  or  Ask for Password   not really sure what the difference is  and then when I tried to connect to the site again it gave me a prompt to enter my password and then connected successfully    It s not ideal as it means you have to remember and re-type you password every time you connect  but better than having to install 2 instances of FileZilla    I totally agree that it would be very useful in the Site Manager to have full options of how you would like FileZilla to connect to each site which is set up  whether to use a password  key  etc     Hope this is helpful    Tim   Also see   https   forum filezilla-project org viewtopic php t 34676  So  it seems   For multiple FTP sites with keys   passwords  use multiple Filezilla installs  OR  use the same ppk key for all servers   I wish there was a way to tell FileZilla which ppk is for which site in Site Manger

User · Answer

the most simple and straight forward is to create a FTP login   Here is a little and easy to understand tutorial site on stackoverflow itself  how to set things up in 2min     Setting up FTP on Amazon Cloud Server

User · Answer

This is very simple if you used your pem file   I am using MacOS   windows user can follow the same steps     Just download your FileZilla  I m using MacOS - and downloaded free version  that s good enough  Open Site Manager in FileZilla   S  -  New Site      Put your host name in the Host field        Example  eca-  -  -  -111 ap-southwest-9 compute amazonaws com    Select Protocol as SFTP - SSH File Transfer Protocol Select Logon type as Key File Put your user name in the User field   for me it s ubuntu  find your ssh user    Note      OS vs Username      Amazon - ec2-user      Centos - centos      Debian - admin or root      Fedora - ec2-user      RHEL - ec2-user or root      SUSE - ec2-user or root      Ubuntu - ubuntu or root    For Key file field  browse your pem file  and click Connect       That s all    have fun     Note     Remember to allow SSH connection to your IP address from EC2  If not you will get connecting error message    Note  Allowing your IP to connect your aws instance via SFTP     EC2 -  SecurityGroups -  SSH -  Inbound rules -  Edit -  Add Rule     SSH TCP 22 My IP it s get ip automatically   name for rule  -  Save

User · Answer

https   www cloudjojo com how-to-connect-ec2-machine-with-ftp    First you have to install some ftp server on your ec2 machine like vsftpd  Configure vsftpd config file to allow writes and open ports  Create user for ftp client  Connect with ftp client like filezilla    Make sure you open port 21 on aws security group

User · Answer

You can use any FTP client  I use winscp and it works just fine  In all these clients  you can specify the ssh secure key

User · Answer

Make sure you use port 22  Filezilla will default to port 21 for SFTP

User · Answer

Old question but what I ve found is that  all you need is to add the ppk file  Settings -  Connections -  SFTP -  Add keyfile User name and the host is same as what you would provide when using putty which is mentioned in http   docs aws amazon com AWSEC2 latest UserGuide ec2-connect-to-instance-linux html Might help someone

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