How To Force SSH Client To Use Given Private Key ( identity file )

To force the SSH client to use a specific private key (identity file), you can use the -i option when connecting to the remote server.

Here’s the syntax to use:

Replace /path/to/private/key with the path to your private key, user with the username on the remote server, and hostname with the hostname or IP address of the remote server.

For example, if your private key is located in the ~/.ssh directory and is named mykey, and you want to connect to a remote server with the IP address 192.168.1.100 as the user myuser, you would use the following command:

This will force the SSH client to use the specified private key when connecting to the remote server.

Note that if your private key is protected by a passphrase, you will be prompted to enter the passphrase when connecting to the remote server.