Decrypting a PGP Message

Last updated: May 2026

To read an encrypted message sent to you, you need to decrypt it using your private key.

Decryption Steps

gpg --decrypt encrypted-message.asc

• You will be prompted for your private key passphrase.
• The decrypted message is printed to the console (or saved to a file with --output).

To decrypt and save to a file:

gpg --decrypt --output message.txt encrypted-message.asc