How To Install Xrdp Server on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS

In this tutorial, we will show you how to install Xrdp Server on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS. For those of you who didn’t know, Xrdp is an open-source implementation of the Microsoft Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) that allows you to graphically control a remote system. The protocol has more capabilities than VNC, like attaching local drives or printers to the remote computer. It is capable of accepting connections from rdesktop, freerdp, and remote desktop clients on other platforms.

This article assumes you have at least basic knowledge of Linux, know how to use the shell, and most importantly, you host your site on your own VPS. The installation is quite simple and assumes you are running in the root account, if not you may need to add ‘sudo‘ to the commands to get root privileges. I will show you the step-by-step installation of the Xrdp Server on an Ubuntu 20.04 (Bionic Beaver) server.

Prerequisites

• A server running one of the following operating systems: Ubuntu 20.04, 18.04, 16.04, and any other Debian-based distribution like Linux Mint.
• It’s recommended that you use a fresh OS install to prevent any potential issues.
• A non-root sudo user or access to the root user. We recommend acting as a non-root sudo user, however, as you can harm your system if you’re not careful when acting as the root.

Install Xrdp Server on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS Focal Fossa

Step 1. First, make sure that all your system packages are up-to-date by running the following apt commands in the terminal.

sudo apt update
sudo apt upgrade

Step 2. Installing the desktop environment on the Ubuntu system.

• Install Gnome:

sudo apt update
sudo apt install ubuntu-desktop

• Install Xfce:

sudo apt update
sudo apt install xubuntu-desktop

Step 3. Installing XRDP server on Ubuntu 20.04.

Now, Run the following command to install xrdp server on Ubuntu:

sudo apt install xrdp

Once the installation, the Xrdp service will automatically start. You can verify Xrdp using the following command:

sudo systemctl status xrdp

Step 4. Configuring Firewall.

The Xrdp daemon listens on port 3389 on all interfaces. Run this command to allow Xrdp through the local firewall:

sudo ufw allow 3389

Step 5. Connecting to the Xrdp Server.

Now that you have set up your Xrdp server, it is time to open your Xrdp client and connect to the server. I use Remmina to connect from my laptop running Ubuntu. Windows users have an RDP connection application by default on their machine.

Congratulations! You have successfully installed XRDP. Thanks for using this tutorial for installing XRDP open-source remote desktop protocol on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS Focal Fossa system. For additional help or useful information, we recommend you check the official XRDP website.