Remove folder in linux with all files

In Unix, how do you remove everything in the current directory and below it?

But how do you delete everything in the current directory as well as every subdirectory below it and the contents of all of those subdirectories?

10 Answers 10

Practice safe computing. Simply go up one level in the hierarchy and don’t use a wildcard expression:

The two dashes — tell rm that is not a command-line option, even when it begins with a dash.

Because you are specifically matching a named directory and are thus less likely to delete something that you don’t intend to delete.

doesn’t it delete the directory itself too? You have to do mkdir afterwards. But then any hardlink referring to that directory will be a distinct directory afterwards.

hmm. i thought he wanted to delete everything in the current directory, but not the directory itself. how do we do that?

Will delete all files/directories below the current one.

If you want to do the same with another directory whose name you have, you can just name that

If you want to remove not only the sub-directories and files of it, but also the directory itself, omit -mindepth 1 . Do it without the -delete to get a list of the things that will be removed.

I needed to delete all the files in sub-directories, but did not want to delete the sub-directories themselves. find -mindepth 2 -delete worked great!

You need -mindepth 1 if you are specifying a directory ( find -mindepth 1 -delete ). Otherwise Johannes is right it will not delete the current working directory (when using find -delete ).

I tried: find -mindepth 1 -delete but i got illegal option — m but it worked great when i removed the mindepth option find . -delete

and then hit ESC-*, and bash will expand the * to an explicit list of files and directories in the current working directory.

• I can review the list of files to delete before hitting ENTER.
• The command history will not contain «rm -rf *» with the wildcard intact, which might then be accidentally reused in the wrong place at the wrong time. Instead, the command history will have the actual file names in there.
• It has also become handy once or twice to answer «wait a second. which files did I just delete?». The file names are visible in the terminal scrollback buffer or the command history.

In fact, I like this so much that I’ve made it the default behavior for TAB with this line in .bashrc:

bind TAB:insert-completions 

Update: The . stands for current directory, but we cannot use this. The command seems to have explicit checks for . and .. . Use the wildcard globbing instead. But this can be risky.

A safer version IMO is to use:

(this prompts you for confirmation before deleting every file/directory.)

When doing things like this, I’ve found a quick ls -r . first lets you see what you are going to delete. Useful to give a quick idea that you aren’t going to delete the whole disk.

@Yen — because if you do it in the wrong place you can get disastrous results. Using a specific name in the wrong place can only go wrong if the same subdirectory happens to exist there.

It is correct that rm –rf . will remove everything in the current directly including any subdirectories and their content. The single dot ( . ) means the current directory. be carefull not to do rm -rf .. since the double dot ( .. ) means the previous directory.

This being said, if you are like me and have multiple terminal windows open at the same time, you’d better be safe and use rm -ir . Lets look at the command arguments to understand why.

First, if you look at the rm command man page ( man rm under most Unix) you notice that –r means «remove the contents of directories recursively». So, doing rm -r . alone would delete everything in the current directory and everything bellow it.

In rm –rf . the added -f means «ignore nonexistent files, never prompt». That command deletes all the files and directories in the current directory and never prompts you to confirm you really want to do that. -f is particularly dangerous if you run the command under a privilege user since you could delete the content of any directory without getting a chance to make sure that’s really what you want.

On the otherhand, in rm -ri . the -i that replaces the -f means «prompt before any removal». This means you’ll get a chance to say «oups! that’s not what I want» before rm goes happily delete all your files.

In my early sysadmin days I did an rm -rf / on a system while logged with full privileges (root). The result was two days passed a restoring the system from backups. That’s why I now employ rm -ri now.

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How to Remove (Delete) a File or Directory in Linux

Note: If you feel that a directory is misplaced and you do not want to remove it, try moving it to a different place. To learn how, visit our post How to Move Directories in Linux.

How To Remove or Delete Linux Files

The rm command deletes files in a Linux. The command unlinks the data from the file name, allowing the user to overwrite on that particular storage space.

To delete a single file, entering the following in the command line:

The rm command can be used to delete more than one file at a time:

rm filename_1 filename_2 filename_3

Wildcards can be used with this command.

For example, to delete all files with the .bmp filename, enter:

This method is also used to delete all files that contain a string of characters:

This will erase any file that has the word sample in the name.

The system will search the current directory for the file you want to remove.

To delete a file in a different directory, either switch to that directory first:

Or you can specify the file location in a single command directly:

Note: Once the rm command has deleted a file, you will not be able to access it. The only way to retrieve a file would be to restore it from a backup (if one is available).

rm Command Options

You can adjust the way the rm command works by adding options. An option is a hyphen, followed by one or more letters that stand for commands.

If you’re deleting multiple files, add a confirmation prompt. Use the –i option to use an interactive dialog:

Confirm the deletion of files by typing ‘yes’ or ‘no.’

To display the progress of the deletion with the v or verbose command:

The output confirms that the file test.txt has been successfully removed.

To force the removal of a file that’s write-protected, use the –f option:

To use sudo privileges for a file that says Access denied and delete it:

Note: Read about sudo rm -rf and why it is a dangerous Linux command.

How to Delete a Directory in Linux

A linux directory (or folder) can be empty, or it can contain files. To remove a directory in Linux, use one of the following two commands:

• rmdir command – removes empty directories/folders
• rm command – removes a directory/folder along with all the files and sub-directories in it

Remove Directory Linux with rm Command

By adding the -r (-R) option to the rm command, you can remove a directory along with all its contents.

To remove a directory (and everything inside of it) use the –r option as in the command:

This will prompt you for confirmation before deleting.

To remove a directory without confirmation:

Also, you can delete more than one directory or folder at a time:

rm –r dir_name1 dir_name2 dir_name3

Remove Directories in Linux with rmdir Command

Remember, the rmdir command is used only when deleting empty folders and directories in Linux. If a specified directory is not empty, the output displays an error.

The basic syntax used for removing empty Linux folders/directories is:

Additionally, you can delete multiple empty directories at once by typing:

rmdir [dir_name1][dir_name2][dir_name3]

If the command finds content in one of the listed directories, it will skip it and move on to the next one.

Note: To permanently delete a file in Linux by overwriting it, use the shred command.

With this tutorial, deleting files and directories in Linux was made easy. The rm and rmdir commands are flexible with many options available.

Vladimir is a resident Tech Writer at phoenixNAP. He has more than 7 years of experience in implementing e-commerce and online payment solutions with various global IT services providers. His articles aim to instill a passion for innovative technologies in others by providing practical advice and using an engaging writing style.

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From a terminal window: When I use the rm command it can only remove files.
When I use the rmdir command it only removes empty folders. If I have a directory nested with files and folders within folders with files and so on, is there a way to delete all the files and folders without all the strenuous command typing? If it makes a difference, I am using the Mac Bash shell from a terminal, not Microsoft DOS or Linux.

Just in case you wish to restore the files in future , don’t use «rm» for such cases . Use «rm-trash» : github.com/nateshmbhat/rm-trash

4 Answers 4

-r «recursive» -f «force» (suppress confirmation messages)

+1 and glad you added the «Be careful!» part. definitely a «Sawzall» command that can quickly turn a good day into a bad one.. if wielded carelessly.

@itsmatt: You know what they say. give someone a Sawzall, and suddenly every problem looks like hours of fun!

On a Mac? Do this instead: brew install trash then trash -rf some_dir This will move the unwanted directory into your trashbin instead of just vanishing Prestige-style into the ether. (source)

Would remove everything (folders & files) in the current directory.

But be careful! Only execute this command if you are absolutely sure, that you are in the right directory.

Yes, there is. The -r option tells rm to be recursive, and remove the entire file hierarchy rooted at its arguments; in other words, if given a directory, it will remove all of its contents and then perform what is effectively an rmdir .

The other two options you should know are -i and -f . -i stands for interactive; it makes rm prompt you before deleting each and every file. -f stands for force; it goes ahead and deletes everything without asking. -i is safer, but -f is faster; only use it if you’re absolutely sure you’re deleting the right thing. You can specify these with -r or not; it’s an independent setting.

And as usual, you can combine switches: rm -r -i is just rm -ri , and rm -r -f is rm -rf .

Also note that what you’re learning applies to bash on every Unix OS: OS X, Linux, FreeBSD, etc. In fact, rm ‘s syntax is the same in pretty much every shell on every Unix OS. OS X, under the hood, is really a BSD Unix system.

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