Adding a service to autostart

Category: Linux Administration · Updated 2026-08-10

systemd (AlmaLinux, Rocky Linux, CentOS 7 and later, Ubuntu 16.04 and later)

Enable the httpd service at boot:

systemctl enable httpd.service

Disable it:

systemctl disable httpd.service

Check the status:

systemctl status httpd.service

Enable and start it in one command:

systemctl enable --now httpd.service

List everything that starts automatically:

systemctl list-unit-files --state=enabled

SysV init (CentOS 6 and earlier)

Older systems use chkconfig. The syntax is:

chkconfig --list service_name
chkconfig --add service_name
chkconfig --del service_name
chkconfig [--level levels] service_name <on|off|reset>

List the services that load at boot:

chkconfig --list | grep on

Check whether httpd is enabled:

chkconfig --list httpd

Enable it at run level 3:

chkconfig --level 3 httpd on

Enable it at every level:

chkconfig httpd on

RedHat-derived distributions such as CentOS and Fedora use SysV init with six run levels:

0 — Halt
1 — Single-user text mode
2 — Not used (user-definable)
3 — Full multi-user text mode
4 — Not used (user-definable)
5 — Full multi-user graphical mode

Enabling services at run level 3 (multi-user text mode) is recommended.