For information, balena CLI v13.3.0 or later also allows balena ssh <device-ip-address> to be used with production variants of balenaOS without the need of adding a ssh key to the config.json file. This requires the device to be running balenaOS v2.44.0 or later. The combinations are:
| Command | balenaOS (dev) | balenaOS (prod) < v2.44.0 | balenaOS (prod) >= v2.44.0 |
|---|---|---|---|
balena ssh <device-UUID> |
OK 
|
OK
|
OK
|
balena ssh <device-ip-address> |
OK
|
SSH key needs to be added to config.json
|
OK (CLI v13.3.0 or later) |
Also for information, on Windows, note that the balena CLI makes use of the Microsoft’s built-in ssh client that ships with Windows 10 or later. It is not compatible with PuTTY. Check the following answer for more details: add SSH key after provisioning to production device? - #10 by pdcastro