Boot Ubuntu 16.04 Into Command Line / Do Not Start GUI
Answer : You could disable the display manager service with systemctl . For example if your display manager is lightdm then run: sudo systemctl disable lightdm.service This will prevent the service from starting at boot. Edit : I forgot to mention how to start the GUI. It is as simple as starting the systemd service: sudo systemctl start lightdm.service Instead of text use runlevel 3 : GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX="3" # To remove all the fancy graphics you need to get rid of `splash`. GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT=”quiet” # Uncomment to disable graphical terminal (grub-pc only) GRUB_TERMINAL=console Then update-grub and reboot. But you really only need GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX="3" . For quick test hit ESC during booting to get into the grub boot menu. Then press e and find the line which specifies kernel and add 3 at the end: linux /vmlinuz root=/dev/mapper/ubuntu ro 3 Boot it with CTRL + x Ideally I also want to be able to start GUI by typ...