🚀How to Launch a RHEL9 Virtual Machine on AWS (Free Tier)

In this post, I’ll walk you through launching a Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 (RHEL9) virtual machine using Amazon EC2. This setup is beginner-friendly, using free-tier eligible services. This setup allows you to practice Linux and cloud skills; this may also be an option when a physical test machine is not available.

📑 Table of Contents

1. What You’ll Need
2. Step 1: Launch an EC2 Instance
3. Step 2: Configure Instance Details
4. Step 3: Set Inbound Security Group Rules
5. Step 4: Connect to Your Instance via SSH
6. Step 5: Verify OS and Update the System

🧾 What You’ll Need

• An AWS Free Tier account
• Terminal access (CloudShell)
• A basic understanding of SSH

🪟 Step 1: Launch an EC2 Instance

1. Log into the AWS Management Console
2. Navigate to the EC2 Dashboard and click Launch Instance
3. Enter a name (e.g., rhel9-vm)
4. Under Amazon Machine Image (AMI), select:
   • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 (HVM), SSD Volume Type
   • Found under the Quick Start AMIs
   • ✅ Marked as Free Tier eligible

⚙️ Step 2: Configure Instance Details

• Instance type: t2.micro (Free Tier)
• Key pair:
  • Create a new one or use an existing .pem file
  • Make sure to download and save it securely
• Storage: 10 GiB is the default and works fine for this setup
• Network settings: Use the default VPC or your preferred subnet

🔐 Step 3: Set Inbound Security Group Rules

Make sure the instance allows SSH access:

This should be default, but here are edit steps if needed:

1. Under Security Group Settings, click Edit inbound rules
2. Add a rule with the following:
   • Type: SSH
   • Protocol: TCP
   • Port Range: 22
   • Source: My IP (recommended)

This is required to access your VM via SSH.

🌐 Step 4: Connect to Your Instance via SSH

Once your instance state is running, do the following:

1. Locate the Public IPv4 address in the EC2 dashboard
2. In your terminal, navigate to the folder with your .pem file

3. Change the permissions to secure the key:
   

   chmod 400 your-key.pem 

4. Connect to your instance:
   

   ssh -i your-key.pem ec2-user@your-public-ip 

⚠️ Without the correct permissions on the .pem file, SSH will throw a warning and refuse to connect. Use chmod 400 to fix this.

Snippet:

🖥️ Step 5: Verify OS and Update the System

Once logged in, verify the RHEL version:

cat /etc/redhat-release 

You should see:

Red Hat Enterprise Linux release 9.x (Plow) 

Snippet:

Update installed packages:

sudo dnf update -y 

📌 Key Reminders

• ✅ RHEL 9 is available in Quick Start AMIs and is Free Tier eligible
• 🔐 Inbound security group rules must allow SSH (TCP on port 22)
• 🔑 Set file permissions with chmod 400 before connecting via SSH
• 👤 Use the default EC2 username: ec2-user

🧠 What I Learned

• Launching a Linux instance on AWS is straightforward and quick
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 is a stable and powerful system
• Understanding security group settings is key for successful connections

🔧 Next Steps

I’ll be using RHEL9 to:

• Practice Linux terminal commands
• Explore system-level configurations and services

💬 Let’s Connect

https://www.linkedin.com/in/ltwilliams-tech/

If you’re exploring AWS, Linux, or cloud computing, feel free to connect or drop your thoughts.