The Linux Daily

How To: Add a “Press Any Key to Continue” Message to a Script

Adding a “Press any key to continue” message to a script is actually quite easy because it’s already built into the read command. Here’s a couple examples of how to use it:

#!/bin/sh

echo "A First Method"
read -s -n 1 -p "Press any key to continue..."

# insert echo here for cleaner output
echo

echo "A Second Method"
echo "Press any key to continue..."
read -s -n 1 any_key
echo "Now exiting"
exit 0

Note: “any_key” was simply a made up name. It can be anything. As always, be sure to take a look at the man page for more information!