Updated: 03/10/2024 by Computer Hope
The default user is a special user account in an operating system containing the default profile data for new users.
For example, Microsoft Windows has a default user profile. In Windows 10, this profile is located in the directory C:\Users\, with a name of Default or something similar. The contents of this default user profile are provided to every new user account on the system. When a new user profile is created, all the default settings and files are copied to the new user's profile directory.
In Linux, the default user profile, also known as the skeleton profile, is located in the directory /etc/skel/. A different skeleton profile can be specified when adding a user with the adduser command, either interactively or by specifying the --home DIR option.
