Terraform Cloud overview - Commands & Configuration

Introduction

Terraform Cloud helps teams work together to create and manage infrastructure safely and efficiently. It solves the problem of sharing infrastructure code and automating deployments without manual errors.

When you want to share infrastructure code with your team and control who can make changes.

When you want to automatically apply infrastructure changes after reviewing them.

When you want to keep a history of all infrastructure changes and who made them.

When you want to avoid manual mistakes by automating infrastructure deployment.

When you want to manage infrastructure across multiple cloud providers from one place.

Commands

This command logs you into Terraform Cloud so you can connect your local Terraform to the cloud service.

Terminal

terraform login

Expected Output

Token saved to configuration file.

You are now logged in.

This command initializes your Terraform working directory and configures it to use Terraform Cloud for state management and runs.

Terminal

terraform init

Expected Output

Initializing the backend...

Successfully configured the backend "remote".



Terraform has been successfully initialized!

This command creates an execution plan showing what changes Terraform will make to your infrastructure.

Terminal

terraform plan

Expected Output

An execution plan has been generated and is shown below.

Resource actions are indicated with the following symbols:

  + create



Plan: 1 to add, 0 to change, 0 to destroy.

This command applies the planned changes to your infrastructure automatically without asking for confirmation.

Terminal

terraform apply -auto-approve

Expected Output

aws_instance.example: Creating...

aws_instance.example: Creation complete after 10s [id=i-1234567890abcdef0]



Apply complete! Resources: 1 added, 0 changed, 0 destroyed.

→

-auto-approve - Skips manual approval to apply changes immediately

Key Concept

If you remember nothing else, remember: Terraform Cloud lets teams safely share and automate infrastructure changes from one central place.

Common Mistakes

Not logging into Terraform Cloud before running terraform init

Terraform cannot connect to Terraform Cloud backend and will fail to initialize properly.

Always run 'terraform login' first to authenticate before initializing.

Running terraform apply without reviewing the plan

You might apply unintended changes that could break your infrastructure.

Run 'terraform plan' first to review changes before applying.

Not using version control with Terraform Cloud

You lose track of who made changes and when, increasing risk of errors.

Connect Terraform Cloud to a version control system like GitHub for safe collaboration.

Summary

Use 'terraform login' to connect your local setup to Terraform Cloud.

'terraform init' sets up Terraform Cloud as the backend for state and runs.

'terraform plan' shows what changes will happen before applying.

'terraform apply -auto-approve' applies changes automatically.