How to create a IAM user in AWS

Apr 14, 2022

Learn how to create an AWS IAM user with programmatic access, attaching a policy like AmazonS3FullAccess and getting the access key ID and secret access key.

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In this tutorial I will explain how you can create a user with programmatic access in AWS through the IAM (Identity and Access Management) panel.

If you don’t have an AWS account yet, start here: https://aws.amazon.com.

Once you have an account set up and you’re logged in to AWS, click your name on top and then “My Security Credentials”

AWS account dropdown menu showing My Security Credentials option

On the sidebar click “Users”, and “Add user”. Enable “Programmatic access”.

IAM Add user form with Programmatic access checkbox selected

Move to the next screen via the buttons you find in the bottom of the page (“Next: Permissions”).

Click the “Attach existing policies directly”:

IAM permissions page with Attach existing policies directly option selected

In this example I create a user that can access S3 to upload files.

Type “S3” in the filter to show the S3 policies

Policy search filtered by S3 showing S3 related permissions

Select the AmazonS3FullAccess permission:

AmazonS3FullAccess policy selected with checkmark in policy list

Once the user is created, you’ll have a pair of access key ID and secret access key.

Copy those to your .env file in the project you have to use as environment variables.

Tagged: Services · All topics

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