Overview
PuTTY is a free terminal emulator Windows users can use to connect to their website via SSH. This allows you to run UNIX commands on your server which is not available when connecting using an FTP client.
Downloading PuTTY
Use the following steps to download and set up PuTTY onto your Windows computer.
- On your Windows computer:
- navigate to C:\
- In that directory, create a folder named \bin
It doesn’t matter where you download them, but adding this directory makes it easier to keep track of the files.
- Open the download page in your browser:
- Download the PuTTY files from that site into your C:\bin folder:
There are 2 options when downloading.
Option 1
The package file at the top of the page ending in .msi. This downloads all files you'll need. It downloads all files into C:/Program Files/PuTTY.
Option 2
Download individual files. If you do this, note that there are 3 different choices for each file. You most likely want the 64-bit x86 option.
- putty.exe
- puttygen.exe
- pageant.exe
- Navigate to the directory the files were downloaded to and double click the putty.exe file to open.
You could also create a shortcut on your Desktop for easy access:
- Right click on your Desktop and choose New > Shortcut
- Browse to the location of your putty.exe file (it should be C:\Users\bin\putty.exe)
- Save the shortcut
- The following configuration box appears when you open PuTTY:
- You are now able to configure PuTTY to log into your website. View the following article for instructions.