43

I am trying to add key that I have generated to the ssh agent. Below are my steps

C:\repo>ssh-keygen
Generating public/private rsa key pair.
Enter file in which to save the key (C:\Users\mante1/.ssh/id_rsa):C:\repo\key

After the key is generated, I am starting the ssh agent and adding it

C:\repo>start-ssh-agent
Found ssh-agent at 13460
Found ssh-agent socket at /tmp/ssh-vKzdrs37QYVK/agent.821

C:\repo>ssh-add ~/.ssh/id_rsa
Error connecting to agent: No such file or directory
qa95
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    You need to manually start ssh-agent service first [look here](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/52113738/starting-ssh-agent-on-windows-10-fails-unable-to-start-ssh-agent-service-erro) – Shashwat Pathak Apr 29 '22 at 15:33

8 Answers8

20

VonC is probably right, in that you need to fix your path, but I was facing the same problem despite using the correct one. In my case, I needed to start ssh-agent for the command to work.

Running the sample commands from GitHub was not working, but, since I had installed OpenSSH, I simply started the pre-installed "OpenSSH Authentication Agent" service, on the Services app, as described in this answer.

ravemir
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19
  • Start Windows PowerShell with Run as Administrator mode.
  • Follow these commands there...
Get-Service ssh-agent | Set-Service -StartupType Automatic

# By default the ssh-agent service is disabled. Configure it to start automatically.
# Make sure you're running as an Administrator.

Start-Service ssh-agent

# Start the service

Get-Service ssh-agent

# This should return a status of Running

ssh-add <complete-key-path-here>

Key Path Example: C:\Users\so\.ssh/key-name
# Now load your key files into ssh-agent

Original Source: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/administration/openssh/openssh_keymanagement

ashutosh887
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17

This problem is maybe because you have two types of ssh-agent.exe , you can see them in task-manager , one ssh-agent will be from git and other one would be from OpenSSH.

Fix

  1. End all ssh task from task-manager
  2. Go to the directory where the key is in your case C:\repo\key this should be your working directory and then run start-ssh-agent will automatically add your private key to the ssh and you won't need the ssh-add command .

Imp

  1. start-ssh-agent will use the ssh from git
  2. start ssh-agent will use the ssh from OpenSSH

So there can be inconsistencies between the version of ssh you're using and your keys are added/generated with

Prashant Joshi
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13

If you have generated your key at C:\repo\key, then the key you need to ssh-add is... C:\repo\key, not ~/.ssh/id_rsa

C:\repo>ssh-add C:\repo\key

That would work.

VonC
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12

Try to type:

ssh-agent bash

and then execute:

ssh-add...
Le chat du rabbin
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2

In my case, the ~ was the problem. Once I typed out my full path ssh-add C:\Users\qa95\.ssh\id_rsa it worked.

Looks like the tilde expansion to the user's directory is not fully supported in PowerShell, so even though dir ~\.ssh\id_rsa may work fine, ssh-add doesn't like it.

Grant G
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2

This was also happening to me on Windows. I was able to fix this way:

  1. For Windows, leave a blank passphrase when creating the ssh file
  2. Make sure your HOMEPATH env is pointing to where the .ssh folder is saved
$env:HOMEPATH='C:\Users\<username>'
Marcos Silva
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-3

It's also important to have it exactly in specific user directory in a folder name '.ssh' but the file names don't have to be id_rsa and id_rsa.pub

Faris Kapo
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    They actually do not have to be id_rsa and id_rsa.pub. For instance I have a corporate ssh key with that name, but my personal keys are named id_rsa_personal and id_rsa_personal.pub – Onat Korucu May 21 '22 at 10:20
  • I have updated answer with your infromation – Faris Kapo Jul 23 '22 at 17:25