du - estimate file space usage

SYNOPSIS
du [OPTION]... [FILE]...

See man du.

Flags

  • -h --human-readable - Show human readable format.
  • --si - Like -h, but use powers of 1000 not 1024.
  • -c - Add a summary total to the bottom of the output.
  • -s, --summarize - Show only a total. Same as setting depth to zero. So using -c and -s together is not worthwhile.
  • -d, --max-depth=N- set number of levels.
  • -a, --all - write counts for all files, not just directories.
  • --time - Add last modified time.
  • --exclude=PATTERN - Exclude files that match pattern. e.g. --exclude="*.txt"

Path

Path can be empty or . for current directory.

Use a specific directory.

Or user directory or root.

Use a star to cover all the directories at a level.

General

How to check sizes at any level.

Summary of current directory

$ df -hs

Breakdown of folders

This lists all the folders at the current level and not deeper. And adds a summary total.

$ df -hs *

Breakdown and summary

$ df -hsc *

Sort breakdown

Show human readable sizes and do human readable sort.

$ du -hs * | sort -h

Reverse using tac (opposite of cat).

$ du -hs * | sort -h | tac

If you want to limit:

$ du -hs * | sort -h | tac | head

If you are trying to find the biggest directory/file that is nested, navigate a level down and then run the command again.

source

Specify depth

$ df -h -d 1

User

Summary of home.

$ du -sh ~

Breakdown by top-level directories.

$ du -h ~/*

Whole machine

Summary.

$ sudo du -sh /
99G

Breakdown by top-level directories.

$ sudo du -h /*
0       /bin
96M     /boot
4.0K    /dev
13M     /etc
...

Detailed

Find largest files/directories starting from root directory.

$ cd /

$ sudo du -s -h *

Then focus with cd.

$ cd snap
$ sudo du -sh *

Or replacing the path.

$ sudo du -sh snap/*
4.0K    snap/bin
1.2G    snap/code
531M    snap/core
4.0K    snap/README