Installing Ansible<span id="installation_guide"></span>

Ansible is an agentless automation tool that you install on a single host (referred to as the control node).
From the control node, Ansible can manage an entire fleet of machines and other devices (referred to as managed nodes) remotely with SSH, Powershell remoting, and numerous other transports, all from a simple command-line interface with no databases or daemons required.
Control node requirements
For your control node (the machine that runs Ansible), you can use nearly any UNIX-like machine with Python installed. This includes Red Hat, Debian, Ubuntu, macOS, BSDs, and Windows under a Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) distribution. Windows without WSL is not natively supported as a control node; see Matt Davis' blog post for more information.
Managed node requirements
The managed node (the machine that Ansible is managing) does not require Ansible to be installed, but requires Python to run Ansible-generated Python code. The managed node also needs a user account that can connect through SSH to the node with an interactive POSIX shell.
[!NOTE]
There can be exceptions in module requirements. For example, network modules do not require Python on the managed device. See documentation for the modules you use.
Node requirement summary
You can find details about control and managed node requirements, including Python versions, for each Ansible version in the 
support_life and 
ansible_core_support_matrix sections.
Selecting an Ansible package and version to install
Ansible's community packages are distributed in two ways:
ansible-core: a minimalist language and runtime package containing a set of 
built-in modules and plugins<plugins_in_ansible.builtin>.
ansible: a much larger "batteries included" package, which adds a community-curated selection of 
Ansible Collections <collections> for automating a wide variety of devices.
Choose the package that fits your needs. The following instructions use 
ansible as a package name, but you can substitute 
ansible-core if you prefer to start with the minimal package and separately install only the Ansible Collections you require.
The 
ansible or 
ansible-core packages may be available in your operating systems package manager, and you are free to install these packages with your preferred method. For more information, see the 
installing_distros guide. These installation instructions only cover the officially supported means of installing the python packages with 
pip.
See the 
Ansible package release status table<ansible_changelogs> for the 
ansible-core version included in the package.
Installing and upgrading Ansible with pipx
On some systems, it may not be possible to install Ansible with 
pip, due to decisions made by the operating system developers. In such cases, 
pipx is a widely available alternative.
These instructions will not go over the steps to install 
pipx; if those instructions are needed, please continue to the pipx installation instructions for more information.
Installing Ansible
Use 
pipx in your environment to install the full Ansible package:
$ pipx install --include-deps ansible
You can install the minimal 
ansible-core package:
$ pipx install ansible-core
Alternately, you can install a specific version of 
ansible-core:
$ pipx install ansible-core==2.12.3
Upgrading Ansible
To upgrade an existing Ansible installation to the latest released version:
$ pipx upgrade --include-injected ansible
Installing Extra Python Dependencies
To install additional python dependencies that may be needed, with the example of installing the 
argcomplete python package as described below:
$ pipx inject ansible argcomplete
Include the 
--include-apps option to make apps in the additional python dependency available on your PATH. This allows you to execute commands for those apps from the shell.
$ pipx inject --include-apps ansible argcomplete
If you need to install dependencies from a requirements file, for example when installing the Azure collection, you can use 
runpip.
$ pipx runpip ansible install -r ~/.ansible/collections/ansible_collections/azure/azcollection/requirements.txt
Installing and upgrading Ansible with pip
Locating Python
Locate and remember the path to the Python interpreter you wish to use to run Ansible. The following instructions refer to this Python as 
python3. For example, if you have determined that you want the Python at 
/usr/bin/python3.9 to be the one that you will install Ansible under, specify that instead of 
python3.
Ensuring 
pip is available
To verify whether 
pip is already installed for your preferred Python:
$ python3 -m pip -V
If all is well, you should see something like the following:
$ python3 -m pip -V
pip 21.0.1 from /usr/lib/python3.9/site-packages/pip (python 3.9)
If so, 
pip is available, and you can move on to the 
next step <pip_install>.
If you see an error like 
No module named pip, you will need to install 
pip under your chosen Python interpreter before proceeding. This may mean installing an additional OS package (for example, 
python3-pip), or installing the latest 
pip directly from the Python Packaging Authority by running the following:
$ curl https://bootstrap.pypa.io/get-pip.py -o get-pip.py
$ python3 get-pip.py --user
You may need to perform some additional configuration before you are able to run Ansible. See the Python documentation on installing to the user site for more information.
Installing Ansible
Use 
pip in your selected Python environment to install the full Ansible package for the current user:
$ python3 -m pip install --user ansible
You can install the minimal 
ansible-core package for the current user:
$ python3 -m pip install --user ansible-core
Alternately, you can install a specific version of 
ansible-core:
$ python3 -m pip install --user ansible-core==2.12.3
Upgrading Ansible
To upgrade an existing Ansible installation in this Python environment to the latest released version, simply add 
--upgrade to the command above:
$ python3 -m pip install --upgrade --user ansible
Installing Ansible to containers
Instead of installing Ansible content manually, you can simply build an execution environment container image or use one of the available community images as your control node. See 
getting_started_ee_index for details.
Installing for development
If you are testing new features, fixing bugs, or otherwise working with the development team on changes to the core code, you can install and run the source from GitHub.
[!NOTE]
You should only install and run the 
devel branch if you are modifying 
ansible-core or trying out features under development. This is a rapidly changing source of code and can become unstable at any point.
For more information on getting involved in the Ansible project, see the 
ansible_community_guide.
For more information on creating Ansible modules and Collections, see the 
developer_guide.
Installing 
devel from GitHub with 
pip
You can install the 
devel branch of 
ansible-core directly from GitHub with 
pip:
$ python3 -m pip install --user https://github.com/ansible/ansible/archive/devel.tar.gz
You can replace 
devel in the URL mentioned above, with any other branch or tag on GitHub to install older versions of Ansible, tagged alpha or beta versions, and release candidates.
Running the 
devel branch from a clone
ansible-core is easy to run from source. You do not need 
root permissions to use it and there is no software to actually install. No daemons or database setup are required.
Clone the 
ansible-core repository
$ git clone https://github.com/ansible/ansible.git
$ cd ./ansible
Setup the Ansible environment
Using Bash
$ source ./hacking/env-setup
Using Fish
$ source ./hacking/env-setup.fish
To suppress spurious warnings/errors, use 
-q
$ source ./hacking/env-setup -q
Install Python dependencies
$ python3 -m pip install --user -r ./requirements.txt
Update the 
devel branch of 
ansible-core on your local machine
Use pull-with-rebase so any local changes are replayed.
$ git pull --rebase
Confirming your installation
You can test that Ansible is installed correctly by checking the version:
$ ansible --version
The version displayed by this command is for the associated 
ansible-core package that has been installed.
To check the version of the 
ansible package that has been installed:
$ ansible-community --version
Adding Ansible command shell completion
You can add shell completion of the Ansible command line utilities by installing an optional dependency called 
argcomplete. It supports bash, and has limited support for zsh and tcsh.
For more information about installation and configuration, see the argcomplete documentation.
Installing 
argcomplete
If you chose the 
pipx installation instructions:
$ pipx inject --include-apps ansible argcomplete
If you chose the 
pip installation instructions:
$ python3 -m pip install --user argcomplete
Configuring 
argcomplete
There are 2 ways to configure 
argcomplete to allow shell completion of the Ansible command line utilities: globally or per command.
Global configuration
Global completion requires bash 4.2.
$ activate-global-python-argcomplete --user
This will write a bash completion file to a user location. Use 
--dest to change the location or 
sudo to set up the completion globally.
Per command configuration
If you do not have bash 4.2, you must register each script independently.
$ eval $(register-python-argcomplete ansible)
$ eval $(register-python-argcomplete ansible-config)
$ eval $(register-python-argcomplete ansible-console)
$ eval $(register-python-argcomplete ansible-doc)
$ eval $(register-python-argcomplete ansible-galaxy)
$ eval $(register-python-argcomplete ansible-inventory)
$ eval $(register-python-argcomplete ansible-playbook)
$ eval $(register-python-argcomplete ansible-pull)
$ eval $(register-python-argcomplete ansible-vault)
You should place the above commands into your shell's profile file such as 
~/.profile or 
~/.bash_profile.
Using 
argcomplete with zsh or tcsh
See the argcomplete documentation.
intro_adhoc
Examples of basic commands
working_with_playbooks
Learning ansible's configuration management language
installation_faqs
Ansible Installation related to FAQs
ansible_forum
Join the Ansible community forum to get help and share insights
communication_irc
How to join Ansible chat channels