Which format does AWS use for private key files in key pairs?

Question

AHAMEDSATHICK MOHAMEDALI · Accepted Answer

PEM (Privacy Enhanced Mail) format Explanation: When you create an AWS key pair for EC2 instances, AWS provides a private key file in .pem format. This private key is used to securely connect to your instance via SSH (for Linux) or PuTTY (on Windows, after converting to .ppk). The corresponding public key is stored on the EC2 instance for authentication. Key points: PEM file contains the private key in base64 encoded text. You must keep it safe because AWS does not allow re-downloading the private key after creation.

AHAMEDSATHICK MOHAMEDALI · Answer

AWS uses the PEM (Privacy Enhanced Mail) format for private key files in key pairs. ✅ 🔹 Details: File extension: .pem Format type: Base64-encoded PEM file (usually containing an RSA or ED25519 private key) Purpose: Used for securely connecting to Amazon EC2 instances via SSH (for Linux) or to decrypt passwords (for Windows). 🔹 Example: When you create a key pair in AWS: AWS gives you a file like my-key.pem You use it to connect:

Which format does AWS use for private key files in key pairs?

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