VPS: SteamCMD Linux Setup

This guide was created with the following products:

(Details may vary with products from different providers but the main concepts remain the same)

VPS

Introduction

SteamCMD is an essential tool that is necessary for installing dedicated servers for a wide variety of games including Palworld, Enshrouded and more. In this guide, we will explore the first-time setup process for installing SteamCMD to your Linux server. We will be using Ubuntu in the examples, but the process should be very similar for other distributions.

Preparation

To begin with, connect to your VPS or root server via SSH. Use our SSH Initial Access guide if you need help doing this.

Installing SteamCMD

Once you have accessed your server, you will need to setup SteamCMD in order to be able to download the necessary dedicated server files. SteamCMD is the command-line (CLI) version of the Steam client and is the tool which allows you to easily download a range of Steam workshop and dedicated server files.

As usual with Linux it is best to first update the system, by running the following based on the distro you use:

// Debian
sudo apt-get update

// Ubuntu
sudo apt update

// CentOS
sudo yum update

// OpenSUSE
sudo zypper up

// Fedora
sudo dnf upgrade --refresh

Now you will need to install a few packages. These are broken down as following:

• The software-properties-common package makes management of your distro and independent software sources easy.
• SteamCMD is a 32-bit tool, therefore the i386 architecture must be added so the appropriate software is installed to your system to support this.
• Since SteamCMD is proprietary, this also means that you either need the multiverse or non-free package depending on your Linux Distro, as these are usually not included in the default repository.

sudo apt install software-properties-common
sudo dpkg --add-architecture i386

// Debian & Ubuntu
sudo add-apt-repository multiverse

// Other Non-Debian Distros
sudo apt-add-repository non-free

Now run the update command to ensure that your package changes are read and thus installed to your system:

sudo apt update

Finally, you can install SteamCMD by running the following. A license agreement prompt may appear, which you can simply accept to continue.

sudo apt install steamcmd

tip

You can verify that the SteamCMD installation was successful, by simply running steamcmd. Once loaded, the command prompt should show Steam>. You can run quit to exit this afterwards.

With everything now prepared and installed, you can proceed with the next step which involves installing the dedicated server through the use of SteamCMD.

Creating User

We highly recommend creating a separate user to use SteamCMD on. Running on the root user, as with most things, is not recommended for various reasons.

Use the following command to create a user named steam with an optional password of your choice.

sudo useradd -m steam
sudo passwd [your_password] # Optional Password

Once the user is created, you will need to adjust the .bashrc file to provide access to the /usr/games path where SteamCMD is located. This is done by adding an extra path environment variable.

Open the file using nano editor by running:

sudo nano /home/steam/.bashrc

Now scroll down to the end of the file using your arrow keys and add the following path environment variable:

export PATH="/usr/games/:$PATH"

Save the file and quit nano by using CTRL + X, followed by Y to confirm and lastly ENTER.

Conclusion

You have now successfully setup the core SteamCMD functionality for your Linux server. You can now proceed with installing Steam content through the steam user.

We recommend checking out the other guides in this section which cover installing specific games through the use of SteamCMD, that you have now setup.