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The web terminal gives you a full interactive shell inside your pod — no SSH keys, no local tools, just click and type.

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Accessing the Terminal

  1. Go to your pod’s detail page at /dashboard/pods/{name}
  2. Click the Terminal tab
  3. A terminal session opens immediately (pod must be running)
The terminal connects via WebSocket and runs a bash login shell as the instapod user, starting in your pod’s app directory (/home/instapod/app).

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Your Session Survives the Tab

The shell runs inside a tmux session on the pod, so closing the tab only detaches from it. Long jobs - a build, a migration, a tail -f - keep running, and reopening the terminal drops you back into the same session with its output still on screen. Reconnecting after a dropped connection does the same thing. It’s the same session, not a new one. To start over - end whatever is running and clear the history - click Restart and confirm.

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Features

  • Full bash shell - Run any command: install packages, edit files, manage services, run scripts
  • Persistent session - Runs in tmux; closing the tab doesn’t kill what you started
  • Deep scrollback - 100,000 lines of history, scrolled with the mouse wheel
  • Copy to your system clipboard - Click Select, then drag to select. The selection goes to your real clipboard, so you can paste it into any app, not just back into the terminal
  • Auto-resize - Terminal adapts when you resize the browser window
  • Clickable links - URLs in terminal output are clickable
  • No setup required - No SSH keys or external tools needed
Mouse mode is on so the wheel scrolls the pod’s scrollback rather than your browser’s. That’s why a plain click-drag doesn’t select text - the Select button turns mouse reporting off so it does. Click it again to go back to scrolling.

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Terminal Theme

The terminal uses a dark theme matching the InstaPods brand:
  • Background: dark (#0a0a0a)
  • Text: light gray
  • Cursor: green (#22C55E)
  • Font: JetBrains Mono / Fira Code / system monospace

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Terminal vs SSH

The web terminal is enough for almost everything, including long-running work. Reach for SSH when you want to pipe files with scp/rsync, script against the pod, or work while the dashboard is unavailable.

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Requirements

  • Pod must be in running status
  • Browser must support WebSockets (all modern browsers do)

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Common Tasks

The terminal runs as the instapod user (non-root). Use sudo for system-level commands like installing packages.