SSH Connection Refused on Oracle Cloud Free Tier while Installing n8n

Questions
1

Oracle Cloud SSH Connection Refused – Stuck While Installing n8n

Hi all, I’m working on a personal automation project using Oracle Cloud (Free Tier) to self-host n8n, but I’m currently stuck at the SSH connection stage.

Current Setup

  • Oracle Cloud Free Tier
  • VM instances created:
    • Ubuntu: Canonical-Ubuntu-XX
    • Oracle Linux: Oracle-Linux-9.0-2025.0721-01 (tried later)
  • Public IP assigned and visible
  • Trying to SSH using a .pem key

The Problem

  • Getting Connection refused when attempting to SSH
  • Security List: Ingress rule for 0.0.0.0/0, TCP port 22 is open
  • Internet Gateway + Route Table: confirmed and configured
  • Key permissions: set via chmod 400
  • SSH command used:
ssh -i my-key.pem ubuntu@ IP
2

Hey @Motorboy_Shin hope all is good. Welcome to the community.

There could be a number of reasons for connection refused error, let’s go over a few possible scenarios.

  • Can you connect to the VM from elsewhere with the same key?
  • Verify that SSH is actually running on that VM (systemctl)
  • Verify that SSH is listening on port 22 (netstat or ss)
  • Verify TCP connection with nc -vz <PUBLIC_IP> 22
  • Verify that the VM doesn’t impose its own firewall rules (ip_tables or ufw)
  • Verify that the traffic is reaching the VM (tcpdump or ssh debug)
  • Verify:
    • public subnet + public ip
    • security List or NSG rules
    • you are using the correct public ip :slight_smile: (you’d be surprised)
    • user is allowed to ssh into system
    • sshd configuration allows key based access

Quite a few things that can go wrong, as you can see.