All screen commands are prefixed by an escape key, by default Ctrl-a (that's Control-a, sometimes written ^a). To send a literal Ctrl-a to the programs in screen, use Ctrl-a a. This is useful when when working with screen within screen. For example Ctrl-a a n will move screen to a new window on the screen within screen.
| Description | Command |
|---|---|
| Basic | |
| Start a new session with session name | screen -S <session_name> |
| List running sessions / screens | screen -ls |
| Attach to a running session | screen -x |
| Attach to a running session with name | screen -r <session_name> |
| Detach a running session | screen -d <session_name> |
| Getting Out | |
| detach | Ctrl-a d |
| detach and logout (quick exit) | Ctrl-a D D |
| exit screen | Ctrl-a : quit or exit all of the programs in screen. |
| force-exit screen | Ctrl-a C-\ (not recommended) |
| Help | |
| See help | Ctrl-a ? (Lists keybindings) |
| Window Management | |
| Create new window | Ctrl-a c |
| Change to last-visited active window | Ctrl-a Ctrl-a (commonly used to flip-flop between two windows) |
| Change to window by number | Ctrl-a <number> (only for windows 0 to 9) |
| Change to window by number or name | Ctrl-a ' <number or title> |
| Change to next window in list | Ctrl-a n or Ctrl-a <space> |
| Change to previous window in list | Ctrl-a p or Ctrl-a <backspace> |
| See window list | Ctrl-a " (allows you to select a window to change to) |
| Show window bar | Ctrl-a w (if you don't have window bar) |
| Kill current window | Ctrl-a k (not recommended) |
| Kill all windows | Ctrl-a \ (not recommended) |
| Rename current window | Ctrl-a A |
| Split screen | |
| Split display horizontally | Ctrl-a S |
| Split display vertically | Ctrl-a | or Ctrl-a V (for the vanilla vertical screen patch) |
| Jump to next display region | Ctrl-a tab |
| Remove current region | Ctrl-a X |
| Remove all regions but the current one | Ctrl-a Q |
| Misc | |
| Redraw window | Ctrl-a C-l |
| Enter copy mode | Ctrl-a [ or Ctrl-a <esc> (also used for viewing scrollback buffer) |
| Paste | Ctrl-a ] |
| Monitor window for activity | Ctrl-a M |
| Monitor window for silence | Ctrl-a _ |
| Enter digraph (for producing non-ASCII characters) | Ctrl-a Ctrl-v |
| Lock (password protect) display | Ctrl-a x |
| Enter screen command | Ctrl-a : |
| Enable logging in the screen session | Ctrl-a H |
| More References | Blackhillsinfosec QuickRef + Aperiodic QuickRef + TomLee Splitting + Neophob Cheat Sheet + CatOnMat Cheat Sheet PDF |