Boot CentOS 7 into Command Line or GUI Mode

How to boot CentOS 7 into Command Line or GUI Mode

In CentOS 7, the systemctl command can be used to select which mode the OS boots into.

To return the mode CentOS is currently using:

systemctl get-default

To boot CentOS 7 into command line mode:

systemctl set-default multi-user.target

To boot CentOS 7 into command line mode:

systemctl set-default graphical.target

runlevels

Switching boot modes through runlevels in previous versions is not used by CentOS 7 and above.

/etc/inittab

# multi-user.target: analogous to runlevel 3
# graphical.target: analogous to runlevel 5
#
# To view current default target, run:
# systemctl get-default
#
# To set a default target, run:
# systemctl set-default TARGET.target