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How to Update Cloud-Init User Data on a Vultr Cloud Compute Instance

Updated on January 15, 2025

Cloud-Init enables the automatic initialization and configuration of instances during the initial boot phase. It runs user data scripts to customize an instance, install applications, and configure specific packages or services.

Follow this guide to update Cloud-Init user data on a Vultr Cloud Compute instance using the Vultr Customer Portal, API, or CLI.

  • Vultr Customer Portal
  • Vultr API
  • Vultr CLI

  1. Navigate to Products and click Compute.

  2. Click your target Vultr Cloud Compute instance to open its management page.

  3. Navigate to the User-Data tab.

  4. Enter your script or cloud config in the Cloud-Init User-Data field, then click Update to apply the changes.

    Update Cloud-Init user data

  1. Send a GET request to the List Instances endpoint and note your target instance's ID.

    console 
    $ curl "https://api.vultr.com/v2/instances" \
  -X GET \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer ${VULTR_API_KEY}"

  2. Send a PATCH request to the Update Instance endpoint to update the instance's Cloud-Init user data.

    console 
    $ curl "https://api.vultr.com/v2/instances/{instance-id}" \
  -X PATCH \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer ${VULTR_API_KEY}" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  --data '{
    "user_data" : "<cloud-init-data>",
  }'

  1. List all available instances and note your target instance's ID.

    console 
    $ vultr-cli instance list

  2. Upload new Cloud-Init user data to the instance from a file on your workstation.

    console 
    $ vultr-cli instance user-data set <instance-id> --userdata "<script-path>"