How can I check the size of a folder from the Windows command line?

Question

I want to use the Windows command line to calculate the size of all the files in a folder and subfolder. I would normally do this by right-clicking on the folder and clicking "Properties" but I want to be able to do it on the command line.

Which command can I use?

End Anti-Semitic Hate · Accepted Answer · 2016-12-08T21:00:16.057

55

You will want to use dir /a/s so that it includes every file, including system and hidden files. This will give you the total size you desire.

edited Dec 08 '16 at 21:00

answered Nov 07 '14 at 06:34

End Anti-Semitic Hate

8,328

3

Show me how the output of your command gives me the total size of the directory. Edit your answer to include it. I'll delete my comments and reverse my down vote. – dgo Dec 01 '16 at 11:13
3

@user1167442 You clearly haven't tried it. The output includes the exact same size that explorer properties gives you. – DavidPostill Dec 07 '16 at 17:08
4

@DavidPostill - you are correct. I am hang-doggedly ashamed. I will reverse the downvote. That said, I'm still not too keen on this solution - I'd prefer something a bit faster that doesn't require outputting all the other stuff, but it does work. I have erred. - Ahh nuts - it won;t let me reverse my downvote. As soon as I get the reputation to do so, I will reverse it. – dgo Dec 08 '16 at 03:23
@user1167442 Apology accepted. If you press the up arrow for the answer, it reverses the downvote. ;) – End Anti-Semitic Hate Dec 08 '16 at 05:17
it won't reverse it for me. I think it must be too soon or require more reputation before it will let me reverse it.

dgo

Dec 08 '16 at 12:17

1

It worked - downvote removed -) – dgo Dec 09 '16 at 00:04

@user1167442 Thanks. I had a hunch that would allow it to work. :) – End Anti-Semitic Hate Dec 09 '16 at 00:33

thanks for this +. Is there a way to list in descending size order? – May 14 '19 at 15:14

1

@QHarr Yes, go ahead and post a question and I'll write up an answer for you. That way, it will help everyone by being searchable for all to find. – End Anti-Semitic Hate May 14 '19 at 16:23

1

/a causes the dir command to show all files and folders. See https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/administration/windows-commands/dir – cachius Sep 20 '23 at 14:12

1

For me, this answer doesn't really answer the question - I have a large directory and want to know the TOTAL size - this command prints the size of each file - the total may be there too but it is not findable in the long list. – nrp1000 Mar 15 '24 at 13:13

score 27 · Answer 2 · answered Dec 07 '16 at 17:10

27

You can use PowerShell!

$totalsize = [long]0
Get-ChildItem -File -Recurse -Force -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue | % {$totalsize += $_.Length}
$totalsize

This recurses through the entire current directory (ignoring directories that can't be entered) and sums up the sizes of each file. Then it prints the total size in bytes.

Compacted one-liner:

$totalsize=[long]0;gci -File -r -fo -ea Silent|%{$totalsize+=$_.Length};$totalsize

On my machine, this seems slightly faster than a dir /s /a, since it doesn't print each object's information to the screen.

To run it from a normal command prompt:

powershell -command "$totalsize=[long]0;gci -File -r -fo -ea Silent|%{$totalsize+=$_.Length};$totalsize"

answered Dec 07 '16 at 17:10

Ben N

40,965

I wish I spent more time with powershell. I just never like using it for some reason - even though it is super useful for lots of stuff – dgo Dec 09 '16 at 14:55
Great solution - really quick too! – TrojanName Feb 18 '19 at 14:03
I get Get-ChildItem : A parameter cannot be found that matches parameter name 'File' – golimar Jul 18 '22 at 07:03
2

@golimar What Windows or PowerShell version do you have? This works on PowerShell 5.1 (standard for Windows 10) and PowerShell 7, but possibly not on older versions that come with older versions of Windows. I think you could instead remove the -File parameter and instead pipe through ? { $_ -is [System.IO.FileInfo] } before piping into the size accumulator. – Ben N Jul 18 '22 at 16:17
Thanks. It's PS 2.0 on Win7, and it works with that modification – golimar Jul 19 '22 at 06:28

Daniel B · Answer 3 · 2016-07-01T21:13:33.767

12

~~There is no such command built into DOS or Windows Command Line.~~ On Linux, there’s the du (Disk Usage) command.

Microsoft’s Sysinternals line of tools has a tool that is roughly equivalent to du on Linux. It’s also called du. ;)

edited Jul 01 '16 at 21:13

answered Mar 04 '15 at 09:35

Daniel B

62,883

1

du -sh <directory> is my go to on Linux (or windows w/ du via git) to show a human readable summary of the directory size. – kavun Oct 26 '15 at 15:52
Thanks, that's exactly what I needed. As discs get bigger it takes longer and longer to right-click-properties to get file sizes and the result can't be selected and copied into calc to ensure splitting over multiple external discs has written every file in the source folder. I've put that at the end of a robocopy batch piped to a text file then when the batch ends I've got a total file/folder/size metric that can be copy/pasted into calc to ensure the files and bytes are the same as the source. – Michael Stimson Nov 27 '19 at 23:26

score 4 · Answer 4 · edited Aug 08 '16 at 20:05

4

You can still use the command line utility diruse.exe from the Windows 2000 Resource Kit available here:

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/927229

It works on Windows 8.1 without any problems.

edited Aug 08 '16 at 20:05

I say Reinstate Monica

25,968

answered Feb 15 '16 at 12:14

RockHead

41

2

Nice find, could you possibly add in an example of usage? – Burgi Feb 15 '16 at 13:05

score 2 · Answer 5 · answered Jan 13 '16 at 08:21

2

The folder size can be calculated with following batch script:

@echo off
setlocal enabledelayedexpansion

set size=0
for /f "tokens=*" %%x in ('dir /s /a /b %1') do set /a size+=%%~zx
echo.!size!

endlocal

answered Jan 13 '16 at 08:21

no73

21

How to run this on Windows 7? – klm123 Sep 25 '17 at 10:16
2

this won't work if the total size is over 2GB due to the limit of arithmetic in cmd – phuclv Mar 11 '19 at 14:49
...which these days is a pretty serious limitation! – rossmcm Sep 05 '19 at 21:07

SherlockSpreadsheets · Answer 6 · 2019-03-11T13:30:40.313

I realize this question asked for file size analysis using CMD line. But if you are open to using PowerQuery (Excel add-in, versions 2010+) then you can create some pretty compelling file size analysis.

The script below can be pasted into a Blank Query; The only thing you'll need to do is add a parameter named "paramRootFolderSearch" then add your value, such as "C:\Users\bl0040\Dropbox\". I used this as a guide: MSSQLTips: Retrieve file sizes from the file system using Power Query.

This query provided the data for me to create a pivot table ([Folder Root]> [Folder Parent (1-2)], [Name]), and I was able to identify a few files that I could deleted which cleared up a lot of space in my directory.

Here is the M script for PowerQuery:

let
// Parmameters:
    valueRootFolderSearch = paramRootFolderSearch,
    lenRootFolderSearch = Text.Length(paramRootFolderSearch),
//

    Source = Folder.Files(paramRootFolderSearch),
    #"Removed Other Columns" = Table.RenameColumns(
Table.SelectColumns(Source,{"Name", "Folder Path", "Attributes"})
,{{"Folder Path", "Folder Path Full"}}),
    #"Expanded Attributes" = Table.ExpandRecordColumn(#"Removed Other Columns", "Attributes", {"Content Type", "Kind", "Size"}, {"Content Type", "Kind", "Size"}),
    #"fx_Size(KB)" = Table.AddColumn(#"Expanded Attributes", "Size(KB)", each [Size]/1024),
    #"fx_Size(MB)" = Table.AddColumn(#"fx_Size(KB)", "Size(MB)", each [Size]/1048576),
    #"fx_Size(GB)" = Table.AddColumn(#"fx_Size(MB)", "Size(GB)", each [Size]/1073741824),
    fx_FolderRoot = Table.AddColumn(#"fx_Size(GB)", "Folder Root", each valueRootFolderSearch),
    helper_LenFolderPathFull = Table.AddColumn(fx_FolderRoot, "LenFolderPathFull", each Text.Length([Folder Path Full])),
    fx_FolderDepth = Table.AddColumn(helper_LenFolderPathFull, "Folder Depth", each Text.End([Folder Path Full], [LenFolderPathFull]-lenRootFolderSearch+1)),
    #"helperList_ListFoldersDepth-Top2" = Table.AddColumn(fx_FolderDepth, "tmp_ListFoldersDepth", each List.Skip(
  List.FirstN(
    List.RemoveNulls(
      Text.Split([Folder Depth],"\")
    )
  ,3)
,1)),
    #"ListFoldersDepth-Top2" = Table.TransformColumns(#"helperList_ListFoldersDepth-Top2", 
{"tmp_ListFoldersDepth", each "\" & Text.Combine(List.Transform(_, Text.From), "\") & "\"
, type text}),
    #"Select Needed Columns" = Table.SelectColumns(#"ListFoldersDepth-Top2",{"Name", "Folder Root", "Folder Depth", "tmp_ListFoldersDepth", "Content Type", "Kind", "Size", "Size(KB)", "Size(MB)", "Size(GB)"}),
    #"rename_FoldersParent(1-2)" = Table.RenameColumns(#"Select Needed Columns",{{"tmp_ListFoldersDepth", "Folders Parent (1-2)"}})
in
    #"rename_FoldersParent(1-2)"

Folder File Sizes_xlsx.png

Folder File Sizes_xlsx2.png

I WANTED to like this example, I really did. But you've left out way too many things.
Like where /how to paste this query in: Data ribbon > Get Data > From Other Sources > Blank Query then paste it into the white space

How to add the parameter: Power Query Editor > Home ribbon > Manage Parameters> New Parameter

How to load the query to a worksheet: Power Query Editor > Home ribbon > Close & Load > Close &Load

And probably the most important part - how to go from your Data Extract to the summarized Pivot table. — grego, May 04 '21 at 22:22

score 2 · Answer 7 · answered Dec 07 '19 at 07:30

Microsoft offer a tool called Disk Usage which creates a CSV report.

Du (disk usage) reports the disk space usage for the directory you specify. By default it recurses directories to show the total size of a directory and its subdirectories.

Here is how to use it:

Usage: du [-c[t]] [-l | -n | -v] [-u] [-q] Parameter Description

Where the options are:

-c  Print output as CSV. Use -ct for tab delimiting.
-l  Specify subdirectory depth of information (default is all levels).
-n  Do not recurse.
-v  Show size (in KB) of intermediate directories.
-u  Count each instance of a hardlinked file.
-q  Quiet (no banner).

The CSV output is formatted as:

Path, CurrentFileCount, CurrentFileSize, FileCount, DirectoryCount, DirectorySize

Here is the current official link.

"Microsoft offer a tool ..." yes they do, by the means of "sysinternals", who borrowed it from the Unix/Linux world -> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Du_(Unix) -> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Unix#1970s — Hannu, Jun 02 '22 at 16:47

score 2 · Answer 8 · answered Nov 07 '14 at 06:24

2

dir /s Will list the sizes of all the files and the files in all subfolders

answered Nov 07 '14 at 06:24

Keltari

73,243

1

I suggest running dir /s /A:-D /d or dir /s /A:-D for a cleaner/clearer view. You can copy cmd.exe's output to something that can highlight the text "File(s) ### bytes" such as vim, gvim, or editpad.org. – Rublacava Sep 22 '20 at 00:53

score -1 · Answer 9 · answered Nov 30 '17 at 14:17

-1

Just open power shell and do a du -sh <directory> no need to install 3rd party or sys-internals. Within Power-shell you can run some simple Linux like commands like ls or du commands, some of the switches won't work like ls -alt will error as powershell does not know what the -alt is...

answered Nov 30 '17 at 14:17

tmac

7

5

What version of PowerShell are you using? And are you sure you don't have Sysinternals installed? The "du" command does not appear to be built in on any systems I have access to. Some documentation link would be helpful too. – anlag Mar 09 '18 at 09:50
2

I'm on the latest fast insider channel of Windows 10 and there's absolutely no du command available – phuclv Mar 11 '19 at 14:51

score -3 · Answer 10 · edited Nov 22 '16 at 20:49

-3

The "dir" command provides file size, last modification date and time of the current directory. First try to move to the directory that you wish to look at the size of using the cd command, then use the dir command.

C:\>dir

Lists the file size, last modification date and time of all files and directories in the directory that you are currently in, in alphabetical order.

edited Nov 22 '16 at 20:49

Gareth

18,809

answered Nov 07 '14 at 05:38

BDRSuite

6,234

4

This is also a bad answer. This will output the combined size of all the files in the current directory. It will not however output the size of any directories in the current directory. This simply doesn't do what the op is asking. – dgo Dec 01 '16 at 04:37

How can I check the size of a folder from the Windows command line?

10 Answers10

Linked