Find home directory in linux

Get home directory by username

Please do not use eval or bash -c with a variable. I added an answer that works safely for an Linux/Unix/macOS system with bash (even if you are not using bash as your shell, it likely has bash available because bashisms are everywhere). superuser.com/a/1613980/3376

7 Answers 7

But see Andrew’s comment and glenn’s reply below.

In bash eval isn’t needed it with just echo ~$username it’s okay, but in sh eval is needed if is a variable

This sometimes gives the wrong value, maybe the home folder of a previous account with the same username?

@choroba Add a user, delete the user, then add a user with the same username. If the user’s home folder is different the second time, this command gives the original home folder rather than the current one. glenn jackman’s answer gives the current one.

Can confirm that this won’t work at all if you have anything other than letters and numbers in a username. The method provided by Evan Carroll & Glen Jackmans answer below appears to work at least on Ubuntu 18. E.g: $( getent passwd «john-smith» | cut -d: -f6 )

homedir=$( getent passwd "$USER" | cut -d: -f6 ) 

This will also work on users that are not you. For instance,

homedir=$( getent passwd "someotheruser" | cut -d: -f6 ) 

This is legit, using getenv rather than assuming the location of passwd is even a step further than assuming the location of home is /home/

It seems you are that user — why not

This won’t work if you are in a sudo’ed environment and did not pass sudo the -H or -i flags — $HOME will still be the previous (sudo’ing) user’s home directory.

There is a safe way to do this!

on Linux/BSD/macOS/OSX without sudo or root

user=pi user_home=$(bash -c "cd ~$(printf %q "$user") && pwd") 

NOTE: The reason this is safe is because bash (even versions prior to 4.4) has its own printf function that includes:

%q quote the argument in a way that can be reused as shell input

Compare to how other answers respond to code injection

# "ls /" is not dangerous so you can try this on your machine # But, it could just as easily be "sudo rm -rf /*" $ user="root; ls /" $ printf "%q" "$user" root\;\ ls\ / # This is what you get when you are PROTECTED from code injection $ user_home=$(bash -c "cd ~$(printf "%q" "$user") && pwd"); echo $user_home bash: line 0: cd: ~root; ls /: No such file or directory # This is what you get when you ARE NOT PROTECTED from code injection $ user_home=$(bash -c "cd ~$user && pwd"); echo $user_home bin boot dev etc home lib lib64 media mnt ono opt proc root run sbin srv sys tmp usr var /root $ user_home=$(eval "echo ~$user"); echo $user_home /root bin boot dev etc home lib lib64 media mnt ono opt proc root run sbin srv sys tmp usr var 

on Linux/BSD/macOS/OSX as root

If you are doing this because you are running something as root then you can use the power of sudo:

user=pi user_home=$(sudo -u "$user" sh -c 'echo $HOME') 

on Linux/BSD (but not modern macOS/OSX) without sudo or root

If not, the you can get it from /etc/passwd . There are already lots of examples of using eval and getent , so I’ll give another option:

user=pi user_home=$(awk -v u="$user" -v FS=':' '$1==u ' /etc/passwd) 

I would really only use that one if I had a bash script with lots of other awk oneliners and no uses of cut . While many people like to «code golf» to use the fewest characters to accomplish a task, I favor «tool golf» because using fewer tools gives your script a smaller «compatibility footprint». Also, it’s less man pages for your coworker or future-self to have to read to make sense of it.

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How to Find User’s Home Directory in Linux or Unix

Under a Linux operating system distribution environment, a created/existing system user is associated with a Home directory. The configuration of the Home directory ensures that the files belonging to the currently active Linux user are only accessible to that user unless this user switches to another user account where they will access the Home directory of that switched user.

The files under a Linux Home user directory are specific to the currently active users. The base directory of the Linux operating system is the root (/) directory.

It is from the root (/) directory that we should be able to access the Home (/home) directory.

If you only have a single active user on your Linux operating system environment, dealing with the Home directory is straightforward. The latter statement implies that every created/existing Linux user will have their system username as a directory name under this Linux Home directory.

For instance, listing the directories in the above Home directory lists three other directories to imply that the Linux operating system in question hosts 3 three users.

If we decide to navigate into either of the above Linux user folders, we should first be able to meet the following prerequisite.

It is only by being a sudoer/root user that we can be able to navigate into other Linux users’ Home directories without bumping into permission/access barriers.

From the above display, we have managed to navigate to the Home directory and list the files, folders, and directories associated with user dnyce whose user directory exists within the Home (/home) directory.

The above screen capture also reveals to us the different file permissions associated with the listed files, folders, and directories. The file permissions starting with – e.g – rw-rw-r— , imply that we are dealing with a file and the file permissions starting with d e.g drwxr-xr-x , imply that we are dealing with a folder or directory.

Ways to Find User’s Home Directory in Linux

Before we look at some viable approaches to finding a user’s home directory in Linux, it is important to understand why the Home directory exists. This directory helps differentiate system-wide data from user data such that we do not have to deal with redundancy. Also, important file backup operation becomes flawless.

Navigating to the Home Directory Traditionally

You first need to be sure that the Linux user exists. This approach is a summary of the above-discussed content.

The tilde (~) symbol indicates that we are at the home directory of the currently active user.

The Linux user’s home directory contains directories like Documents, Downloads, Music, Pictures, and Public.

Find User’s Home Directory Using Cd Command

Executing the cd (change directory) command alone should take you to the home directory of the current Linux user.

Another approach is to use cd + tilde (~) should navigate us to the Home directory of the currently logged-in user.

You can also use $HOME command, which takes you to the Home directory as a variable.

Not only do we understand the concept of the Linux user’s home directory, but we can navigate to it from any directory path.

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3 ways to find user home directory in Linux

In Linux, the home directory is where user data is stored. This can be useful for finding files that belong to a particular user, or for troubleshooting purposes. There are three main ways to find a user’s home directory in Linux: by using the environment variable, the ~, or from /etc/passwd file. In this blog post, we will discuss each of these methods in detail. Let’s get started!

What is a user’s home directory in Linux?

A user’s home directory is the location on a Linux system where that user’s personal data and configuration files are stored. By default, each user on a Linux system has their own home directory, which is typically located at /home/username.

Find user home directory with echo $HOME command in Linux

The best way to find a user’s home directory in Linux is using echo $HOME command. To do this, open a terminal and type in the following command: echo $HOME. This will print out the value of the HOME environment variable, which is typically the home directory for the current user.

The $HOME is a shell environmental variable containing a full path to user directory. The $HOME variable is set automatically by the system upon its installation and is usually set to /home/username. However, it is possible to set the $HOME variable to any custom path as required. To see a full path to your home directory execute the following command echo $HOME from your shell terminal.

Find user home directory with echo ~username command in Linux

Another way to find a user’s home directory in Linux is by using the ~ character. This is a shortcut that stands for the home directory of the current user. To use it, simply type in ~ followed by the username you want to find the home directory for. For example, if we wanted to find the home directory for the user ‘jane’, we would type in echo ~jane.

Find user home directory with grep username /etc/passwd command in Linux

The last way to find a user’s home directory in Linux is by looking in the /etc/passwd file. This file contains information about all of the users on the system, including their home directories. To view this file, type in the following command: cat /etc/passwd. This will print out the contents of the file. Scroll through it until you find the entry for the user you are looking for.

You can also use grep username /etc/passwd to get the user info which includes the home directory of this user.

FAQ about user home directory in Linux

What are some common paths for the home directory in Linux?
Some common paths for the home directory in Linux are /home/username, /root, and /var/www.

Can you change the path of the home directory in Linux?
Yes, it is possible to change the path of the home directory in Linux. The $HOME environmental variable can be set to any custom path as required.

That’s it! These are three ways to find a user’s home directory in Linux. Do you have any other tips or tricks? Let us know in the comments below!

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