How to uninstall UFW in Ubuntu?

In this tutorial we are going to show you how to uninstall UFW in Ubuntu, how to remove all of its packages and configuration files and how to make sure to remove all the firewall rules set by it as well.

What is UFW?

In the realm of cybersecurity, UFW is your trusty sidekick, standing for simplicity and effectiveness.

Unlike its complex counterparts, UFW doesn’t require a degree in computer science to understand. It’s like the bouncer at the entrance of a club, deciding who gets in and who stays out, but for your digital world.

UFW is a user-friendly interface to manage the powerful firewall built into Linux systems.

Think of it as the gatekeeper that controls the traffic coming in and out of your device. Whether it’s your neighbor’s cat video trying to download or a mysterious script attempting to sneak in, UFW decides what gets access.

But sometimes you just don’t need it, and that is understandable. While we do recommend to keep UFW on your system, since there is really no need to remove it unless its causing you some issues, it is up to you at the end of the day.

So let’s get started with the tutorial.

Step 1 – Let’s disable UFW before we try to uninstall it

This should do the trick.

sudo ufw disable

Make sure its disabled by running the following command.

sudo ufw status

Step 2 – Uninstall UFW in Ubuntu

Let’s use classic Ubuntu remove command.

sudo apt remove ufw -y

And let’s purge it all by running this.

sudo apt purge ufw

Now UFW is removed. If you want to remove some other packages and dependencies that were required by UFW that you don’t need anymore, just run this.

sudo apt autoremove

After purging UFW, it’s a good idea to check if there are any residual configuration files left. You can check the /etc/ directory for any UFW-related files like this.

ls /etc | grep ufw

In our case, there seems to be /etc/ufw left so we will remove it using rm command.

sudo rm -rf /etc/ufw

Step 3 – Flush all the rules

In some cases, UFW rules can persist even after UFW is removed.

To make sure that’s not the case, let’s run these few commands.

sudo iptables -F
sudo iptables -X
sudo iptables -t nat -F
sudo iptables -t nat -X
sudo iptables -t mangle -F
sudo iptables -t mangle -X
sudo iptables -P INPUT ACCEPT
sudo iptables -P FORWARD ACCEPT
sudo iptables -P OUTPUT ACCEPT

Essentially, these commands will remove all the firewall rules and set default policies to ACCEPT, which is effectively disabling firewall.

If that’s something that you want to do, go ahead, just carefully with these commands, especially with the production systems.

Conclusion

Congratulations. You have successfully learned how to uninstall UFW in Ubuntu. If you are in a need of Linux VPS, we urge you to check out our offer!

Now all that is left is to see what next you are going to do and which ServerLynx article are you going to read. If you have any questions, feel free to open the live chat and let’s connect.