Master the rm Command in Linux/Unix: Quickly Delete Files and Folders in Just 2 Steps

Introduction: What is the rm command?

rm Command in Linux (or Unix – macOS) deletes files and folders. This is a serious command because once files/folders are deleted through its execution, they can’t be recovered so use it with caution.

rm stands for remove. We should always learn the basics of a command by issuing man <command> or <command> --help. This helps us to know the details of the command, e.g.- what is the use of this command, its synopsis, available options flags for this command, and examples related to its use case. See the below screenshots for the same.

Prerequisites

• Introduction to the Linux Command

Synopsis: rm [OPTION]… [FILE]…

Precaution before using the rm command in Linux

Please check file permissions and ownership before issuing this command. Based on the current permissions and ownership of the file/directory, sudo privilege escalation might be needed.

Use cases

• Delete a file
• Delete multiple files
• Delete a directory
• Delete multiple directories

Assumption

for this post, I will assume an ubuntu system user. Please switch this user if you need it. Also we use ~ (symbol of home directory = /home/ubuntu)

Delete a file using the rm command

Synopsis

rm <filename>

• Step 1 – Go inside the directory where the file is located (this step is optional)
• Step 2 – Check if the file exists and you have write access to delete the file
• Step 3 – Delete the file

Suppose you want to delete a file named my_file_1.txt which is located inside ~/linux_commands/rm_command directory.

# Step 1 -  Go inside the directory where file is located (this step is optional)
cd ~/linux_commands/rm_command

# Step 2 -  Check if the file exists and you have write access to delete the file
ls -lht my_file_1.txt

# Step 3 - Delete the file
rm my_file_1.txt

##### if you don't want to follow step 1, simply provide full path in step 2 and step 3 as below
# Step 2 -  Check if the file exists and you have write access to delete the file
ls -lht ~/linux_commands/rm_command/my_file_1.txt

# Step 3 - Delete the file
rm ~/linux_commands/rm_command/my_file_1.txt

if the file owner is root (as shown in the output of ls -lht) use the sudo privilege below

sudo rm my_file_1.txt

Delete multiple files using the rm command

Synopsis

rm <filename> <filename> <filename> <filename> .. <filename>

Steps 1 and 2 will remain the same as described in the previous section, just change step 3 as follows

# Step 1 -  Go inside the directory where file is located (this step is optional)
cd ~/linux_commands/rm_command

# Step 2 -  Check if the file exists and you have write access to delete the file
ls -lht my_file_1.txt my_file_2.txt

# Step 3 - Delete the file
rm my_file_1.txt my_file_2.txt

##### if you don't want to follow step 1, simply provide full path in step 2 and step 3 as below
# Step 2 -  Check if the file exists and you have write access to delete the file
ls -lht ~/linux_commands/rm_command/my_file_1.txt ~/linux_commands/rm_command/my_file_2.txt

# Step 3 - Delete the files
rm ~/linux_commands/rm_command/my_file_1.txt ~/linux_commands/rm_command/my_file_2.txt

Delete a directory using the rm command

Synopsis

rm -r <dir_name>
rm -rf <dir_name>
# -r option is mandatory to remove directory, -f is optional
# flags meaning
-r, -R, --recursive   remove directories and their contents recursively
-f, --force           ignore nonexistent files and arguments, never prompt, using this option will not throw error if the file/directory does not exist

Please follow the below steps (assuming you want to delete my_dir_1)

• Step 1 – Go inside the directory where the given directory(my_dir_1) is located (this step is optional)
• Step 2 – Check if the directory exists and if you have write access to delete the directory(my_dir_1)
• Step 3 – Delete the directory(my_dir_1)

# Step 1 - Go inside the directory where the given directory(my_dir_1) is located (this step is optional)
cd ~/linux_commands/rm_command

# Step 2 -  Check if the directory exists and if you have write access to delete the directory(my_dir_1)
ls -lht my_dir_1

# Step 3 - Delete the directory
rm -r my_dir_1

Delete multiple directories using the rm command

Synopsis

rm -r <dir_name_1> <dir_name_2> .. <dir_name_n>
rm -rf <dir_name_1> <dir_name_2> .. <dir_name_n>
# -r option is mandatory to remove directory, -f is optional
# flags meaning
-r, -R, --recursive   remove directories and their contents recursively
-f, --force           ignore nonexistent files and arguments, never prompt, using this option will not throw error if the file/directory does not exist

Note: It is better to check and delete one directory at a time, also check the directory content one at a time.

Please follow the below steps (assuming you want to delete ~/path1/to/my_dir_1, ~/path2/to/my_dir_2)

• Step 1 – Check if the directory exists and if you have write access to delete the directory(path1/to/my_dir_1, path2/to/my_dir_2)
• Step 2 – Delete the directory(path1/to/my_dir_1, path2/to/my_dir_2)

# Step 1 -  Check if the directory exists and if you have write access to delete the directory(my_dir_1)
ls -lht ~/path1/to/my_dir_1 ~/path2/to/my_dir_2

# Step 2 - Delete the directory
rm -r ~/path1/to/my_dir_1 ~/path2/to/my_dir_2

Additional Tips

• If file is write protected or you don’t have write permission, then first grant this permission (sudo chmod 0664 <filename>)
• if only root user has write access then use sudo (sudo rm <file_name>)

Conclusion

In this simple post, you learnt about deleting files and folders.
Enjoy the post!!

Editorial Team