# pause – Pause playbook execution

- Synopsis
- Parameters
- Notes
- Examples
- Return Values
- Status

## Synopsis

- Pauses playbook execution for a set amount of time, or until a prompt is acknowledged. All parameters are optional. The default behavior is to pause with a prompt.
- To pause/wait/sleep per host, use the wait_for module.
- You can use `ctrl+c` if you wish to advance a pause earlier than it is set to expire or if you need to abort a playbook run entirely. To continue early press `ctrl+c` and then `c`. To abort a playbook press `ctrl+c` and then `a`.
- The pause module integrates into async/parallelized playbooks without any special considerations (see Rolling Updates). When using pauses with the `serial` playbook parameter (as in rolling updates) you are only prompted once for the current group of hosts.
- This module is also supported for Windows targets.

## Parameters

Parameter | Choices/Defaults | Comments
--- | --- | ---

echo
boolean
added in 2.5

Choices:
- no
- yes ←

Controls whether or not keyboard input is shown when typing.
Has no effect if 'seconds' or 'minutes' is set.

minutes - |  | A positive number of minutes to pause for.
prompt - |  | Optional text to use for the prompt message.
seconds - |  | A positive number of seconds to pause for.

## Notes

Note

- Starting in 2.2, if you specify 0 or negative for minutes or seconds, it will wait for 1 second, previously it would wait indefinitely.
- This module is also supported for Windows targets.
- User input is not captured or echoed, regardless of echo setting, when minutes or seconds is specified.

## Examples

    # Pause for 5 minutes to build app cache.
    - pause:
        minutes: 5

    # Pause until you can verify updates to an application were successful.
    - pause:

    # A helpful reminder of what to look out for post-update.
    - pause:
        prompt: "Make sure org.foo.FooOverload exception is not present"

    # Pause to get some sensitive input.
    - pause:
        prompt: "Enter a secret"
        echo: no

## Return Values

Common return values are documented here, the following are the fields unique to this module:

Key | Returned | Description
--- | --- | ---
delta string | always | Time paused in seconds Sample: 2
echo boolean | always | Value of echo setting Sample: True
start string | always | Time when started pausing Sample: 2017-02-23 14:35:07.298862
stdout string | always | Output of pause module Sample: Paused for 0.04 minutes
stop string | always | Time when ended pausing Sample: 2017-02-23 14:35:09.552594
user_input string | if no waiting time set | User input from interactive console Sample: Example user input

## Status

- This module is guaranteed to have backward compatible interface changes going forward. [stableinterface]
- This module is maintained by the Ansible Core Team. [core]

### Red Hat Support

More information about Red Hat’s support of this module is available from this Red Hat Knowledge Base article.

### Authors

- Tim Bielawa (@tbielawa)

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