A run level is a state of init and the whole system that defines what system services are operating and they are identified by numbers.There are 7 different run levels present (run level 0-6) in Linux system for different purpose. The descriptions are given below.
0: Halt System (To shutdown the system)
1: Single user mode
2: Basic multi user mode without NFS
3: Full multi user mode (text based)
4: unused
5: Multi user mode with Graphical User Interface
6: Reboot System
To change the run level, edit the file “/etc/inittab” and change initdefault entry ( id:5:initdefault:). If we want to change the run level on the fly, it can be done using ‘init’ command.
For example,
when we type ‘init 3' in the commandline , this will move the system from current runlevel to runlevl 3. Current level can be listed by typing the command 'who -r'
