Ad-hoc commands in Ansible allow you to execute simple tasks at the command line against one or all of your hosts. Syntax:- ansible <hosts> [-m <module_name>] -a <"arguments"> -u <username> [--become] The list of all modules here: https://docs.ansible.com/ansible/latest/modules/list_of_all_modules.html The ping module: Try to connect to host, verify a usable python and return pong on success root@:/etc/ansible# ansible all -m ping ip address | SUCCESS => { "changed": false, "ping": "pong" } root@:/etc/ansible# ansible all -i ./hosts -m ping root@:/etc/ansible# ansible webservers -m ping