rm -rf equivalent for Windows

Question

I need a way to recursively delete a folder and its children   Is there a prebuilt tool for this  or do I need to write one   DEL  S doesn t delete directories   DELTREE was removed from Windows 2000

User · Answer

del  s  q directorytobedeleted

User · Answer

LATE BUT IMPORTANT ANSWER to anyone who is having troubles installing npm packages on windows machine and if you are seeing error saying  rm -rf     command not found  You can use the bash cli to run rm command on windows   for npm users  you can change the npm s config to npm config set script-shell  C  Program Files Git bin bash exe  this way if the npm package you are trying to install has a post install script that uses rm -rf command  you will be able to run that rm command without needing to change anything in the npm package or disabling the post install scripts config   For example  styled-components uses rm command in their post install scripts   If you want to just use the rm command  you can easily use the bash and pass the arguments    So yes  you can use the  rm  command on windows

User · Answer

You can install GnuWin32 and use  nix commands natively on windows  I install this before I install anything else on a minty fresh copy of windows

User · Answer

USE AT YOUR OWN RISK  INFORMATION PROVIDED  AS IS   NOT TESTED EXTENSIVELY   Right-click Windows icon  usually bottom left    click  Windows PowerShell  Admin     use this command  with due care  you can easily delete all your files if you re not careful    rd -r -include     -force somedir   Where somedir is the non-empty directory you want to remove   Note that with external attached disks  or disks with issues  Windows sometimes behaves odd - it does not error in the delete  or any copy attempt   yet the directory is not deleted  or not copied  as instructed   I found that in this case  at least for me  the command given by  n y in his answer will produce errors like  get-childitem   The file or directory is corrupted and unreadable   as a result in PowerShell

User · Answer

There is also deltree if you re on an older version of windows  You can learn more about it from here  SS64  DELTREE - Delete all subfolders and files

User · Answer

Here is what you need to do     Create a batch file with the following line  RMDIR  S  1  Save your batch file as Remove bat and put it in C  windows  Create the following registry key  HKEY CLASSES ROOT Directory shell Remove Directory  RMDIR   Launch regedit and update the default value HKEY CLASSES ROOT Directory shell Remove Directory  RMDIR  default with the following value   c  windows REMOVE bat    1   Thats it  Now you can right click any directory and use the RMDIR function

User · Answer

You can install GnuWin32 and use  nix commands natively on windows  I install this before I install anything else on a minty fresh copy of windows

User · Answer

First  let   s review what rm -rf does   C  Users ohnob things gt touch stuff txt  C  Users ohnob things gt rm -rf stuff txt  C  Users ohnob things gt mkdir stuff txt  C  Users ohnob things gt rm -rf stuff txt  C  Users ohnob things gt ls -l total 0  C  Users ohnob things gt rm -rf stuff txt   There are three scenarios where rm -rf is commonly used where it is expected to return 0    The specified path does not exist  The specified path exists and is a directory  The specified path exists and is a file    I   m going to ignore the whole permissions thing  but nobody uses permissions or tries to deny themselves write access on things in Windows anyways  OK  that   s meant to be a joke       First set ERRORLEVEL to 0 and then delete the path only if it exists  using different commands depending on whether or not it is a directory  IF EXIST does not set ERRORLEVEL to 0 if the path does not exist  so setting the ERRORLEVEL to 0 first is necessary to properly detect success in a way that mimics normal rm -rf usage  Guarding the RD with IF EXIST is necessary because RD  unlike rm -f  will throw an error if the target does not exist   The following script snippet assumes that DELPATH is prequoted   This is safe when you do something like SET DELPATH  1  Try putting ECHO  1 in a  cmd and passing it an argument with spaces in it and see what happens for yourself   After the snippet completes  you can check for failure with IF ERRORLEVEL 1       Determine whether we need to invoke DEL or RD or do nothing  SET DELPATH DELMETHOD RD PUSHD  DELPATH  2 gt NUL IF ERRORLEVEL 1  SET DELPATH DELMETHOD DEL  ELSE  POPD  IF NOT EXIST  DELPATH  SET DELPATH DELMETHOD NOOP     Reset ERRORLEVEL so that the last command which     otherwise set it does not cause us to falsely detect     failure  CMD  C EXIT 0 IF  DELPATH DELMETHOD   DEL DEL  Q  DELPATH  IF  DELPATH DELMETHOD   RD RD  S  Q  DELPATH    Point is  everything is simpler when the environment just conforms to POSIX  Or if you install a minimal MSYS and just use that

User · Answer

RMDIR   S    Q   drive  path  RD   S    Q   drive  path    S      Removes all directories and files in the specified directory in addition to the directory itself   Used to remove a directory tree   Q      Quiet mode  do not ask if ok to remove a directory tree with  S

User · Answer

RMDIR   S    Q   drive  path  RD   S    Q   drive  path    S      Removes all directories and files in the specified directory in addition to the directory itself   Used to remove a directory tree   Q      Quiet mode  do not ask if ok to remove a directory tree with  S

User · Answer

rmdir  S  Q  DIRNAME

User · Answer

You can install cygwin  which has rm as well as ls etc

User · Answer

The accepted answer is great  but assuming you have Node installed  you can do this much more precisely with the node library  rimraf   which allows globbing patterns  If you use this a lot  I do   just install it globally   yarn global add rimraf   then  for instance  a pattern I use constantly   rimraf      node modules   or for a one-liner that let s you dodge the global install  but which takes slightly longer for the the package dynamic download   npx rimraf      node modules

User · Answer

rmdir  s dirname

User · Answer

rmdir  s dirname

User · Answer

del  s  q directorytobedeleted

User · Answer

here is what worked for me   Just try decreasing the length of the path   i e    Rename all folders that lead to such a file to smallest possible names  Say one letter names  Go on renaming upwards in the folder hierarchy  By this u effectively reduce the path length  Now finally try deleting the file straight away

User · Answer

rmdir  S  Q  DIRNAME

User · Answer

Try this command   del  s foldername

User · Answer

The accepted answer is great  but assuming you have Node installed  you can do this much more precisely with the node library  rimraf   which allows globbing patterns  If you use this a lot  I do   just install it globally   yarn global add rimraf   then  for instance  a pattern I use constantly   rimraf      node modules   or for a one-liner that let s you dodge the global install  but which takes slightly longer for the the package dynamic download   npx rimraf      node modules

User · Answer

rm -r -fo  lt path gt   is the closest you can get in Windows PowerShell  It is the abbreviation of Remove-Item -Recurse -Force -Path  lt path gt    more details

User · Answer

There is also deltree if you re on an older version of windows  You can learn more about it from here  SS64  DELTREE - Delete all subfolders and files

User · Answer

RMDIR or RD if you are using the classic Command Prompt  cmd exe    rd  s  q  path       RMDIR   S    Q   drive  path      RD   S    Q   drive  path       S Removes all directories and files in the specified directory in addition to the directory itself  Used to remove a directory tree        Q Quiet mode  do not ask if ok to remove a directory tree with  S   If you are using PowerShell you can use Remove-Item  which is aliased to del  erase  rd  ri  rm and rmdir  and takes a -Recurse argument that can be shorted to -r  rd -r  path

User · Answer

rm -r -fo  lt path gt   is the closest you can get in Windows PowerShell  It is the abbreviation of Remove-Item -Recurse -Force -Path  lt path gt    more details

User · Answer

You can install cygwin  which has rm as well as ls etc

User · Answer

here is what worked for me   Just try decreasing the length of the path   i e    Rename all folders that lead to such a file to smallest possible names  Say one letter names  Go on renaming upwards in the folder hierarchy  By this u effectively reduce the path length  Now finally try deleting the file straight away

User · Answer

rmdir  S  Q  DIRNAME

User · Answer

rmdir  s dirname

User · Answer

admin   takeown  r  f folder cacls folder  c  G  ADMINNAME  F  T rmdir  s folder   Works for anything including sys files  EDIT  I actually found the best way which also solves file path too long problem as well   mkdir  empty robocopy  mir  empty folder

User · Answer

RMDIR   S    Q   drive  path  RD   S    Q   drive  path    S      Removes all directories and files in the specified directory in addition to the directory itself   Used to remove a directory tree   Q      Quiet mode  do not ask if ok to remove a directory tree with  S

User · Answer

LATE BUT IMPORTANT ANSWER to anyone who is having troubles installing npm packages on windows machine and if you are seeing error saying  rm -rf     command not found  You can use the bash cli to run rm command on windows   for npm users  you can change the npm s config to npm config set script-shell  C  Program Files Git bin bash exe  this way if the npm package you are trying to install has a post install script that uses rm -rf command  you will be able to run that rm command without needing to change anything in the npm package or disabling the post install scripts config   For example  styled-components uses rm command in their post install scripts   If you want to just use the rm command  you can easily use the bash and pass the arguments    So yes  you can use the  rm  command on windows

User · Answer

admin   takeown  r  f folder cacls folder  c  G  ADMINNAME  F  T rmdir  s folder   Works for anything including sys files  EDIT  I actually found the best way which also solves file path too long problem as well   mkdir  empty robocopy  mir  empty folder

User · Answer

Try this command   del  s foldername

User · Answer

First  let   s review what rm -rf does   C  Users ohnob things gt touch stuff txt  C  Users ohnob things gt rm -rf stuff txt  C  Users ohnob things gt mkdir stuff txt  C  Users ohnob things gt rm -rf stuff txt  C  Users ohnob things gt ls -l total 0  C  Users ohnob things gt rm -rf stuff txt   There are three scenarios where rm -rf is commonly used where it is expected to return 0    The specified path does not exist  The specified path exists and is a directory  The specified path exists and is a file    I   m going to ignore the whole permissions thing  but nobody uses permissions or tries to deny themselves write access on things in Windows anyways  OK  that   s meant to be a joke       First set ERRORLEVEL to 0 and then delete the path only if it exists  using different commands depending on whether or not it is a directory  IF EXIST does not set ERRORLEVEL to 0 if the path does not exist  so setting the ERRORLEVEL to 0 first is necessary to properly detect success in a way that mimics normal rm -rf usage  Guarding the RD with IF EXIST is necessary because RD  unlike rm -f  will throw an error if the target does not exist   The following script snippet assumes that DELPATH is prequoted   This is safe when you do something like SET DELPATH  1  Try putting ECHO  1 in a  cmd and passing it an argument with spaces in it and see what happens for yourself   After the snippet completes  you can check for failure with IF ERRORLEVEL 1       Determine whether we need to invoke DEL or RD or do nothing  SET DELPATH DELMETHOD RD PUSHD  DELPATH  2 gt NUL IF ERRORLEVEL 1  SET DELPATH DELMETHOD DEL  ELSE  POPD  IF NOT EXIST  DELPATH  SET DELPATH DELMETHOD NOOP     Reset ERRORLEVEL so that the last command which     otherwise set it does not cause us to falsely detect     failure  CMD  C EXIT 0 IF  DELPATH DELMETHOD   DEL DEL  Q  DELPATH  IF  DELPATH DELMETHOD   RD RD  S  Q  DELPATH    Point is  everything is simpler when the environment just conforms to POSIX  Or if you install a minimal MSYS and just use that

User · Answer

Using Powershell 5 1   get-childitem  logs  -path    -directory -recurse   remove-item -confirm  false -recurse -force   Replace logs with the directory name you want to delete   get-childitem searches for the children directory with the name recursively from current path       remove-item deletes the result

User · Answer

admin   takeown  r  f folder cacls folder  c  G  ADMINNAME  F  T rmdir  s folder   Works for anything including sys files  EDIT  I actually found the best way which also solves file path too long problem as well   mkdir  empty robocopy  mir  empty folder

User · Answer

For deleting a directory  whether or not it exists  use the following   if exist myfolder   rmdir  s q myfolder

User · Answer

RMDIR or RD if you are using the classic Command Prompt  cmd exe    rd  s  q  path       RMDIR   S    Q   drive  path      RD   S    Q   drive  path       S Removes all directories and files in the specified directory in addition to the directory itself  Used to remove a directory tree        Q Quiet mode  do not ask if ok to remove a directory tree with  S   If you are using PowerShell you can use Remove-Item  which is aliased to del  erase  rd  ri  rm and rmdir  and takes a -Recurse argument that can be shorted to -r  rd -r  path

User · Answer

RMDIR   S    Q   drive  path  RD   S    Q   drive  path    S      Removes all directories and files in the specified directory in addition to the directory itself   Used to remove a directory tree   Q      Quiet mode  do not ask if ok to remove a directory tree with  S

User · Answer

Try this command   del  s foldername

User · Answer

RMDIR or RD if you are using the classic Command Prompt  cmd exe    rd  s  q  path       RMDIR   S    Q   drive  path      RD   S    Q   drive  path       S Removes all directories and files in the specified directory in addition to the directory itself  Used to remove a directory tree        Q Quiet mode  do not ask if ok to remove a directory tree with  S   If you are using PowerShell you can use Remove-Item  which is aliased to del  erase  rd  ri  rm and rmdir  and takes a -Recurse argument that can be shorted to -r  rd -r  path

User · Answer

You can install GnuWin32 and use  nix commands natively on windows  I install this before I install anything else on a minty fresh copy of windows

User · Answer

You can install GnuWin32 and use  nix commands natively on windows  I install this before I install anything else on a minty fresh copy of windows

User · Answer

rmdir  S  Q  DIRNAME

User · Answer

rmdir  s dirname

User · Answer

Go to the path and trigger this command   rd  s  q  FOLDER NAME     s   Removes the specified directory and all subdirectories including any files  Use  s to remove a tree    q   Runs rmdir in quiet mode  Deletes directories without confirmation        Displays help at the command prompt

User · Answer

via Powershell   Remove-Item -Recurse -Force  TestDirectory    via Command Prompt   https   stackoverflow com a 35731786 439130

User · Answer

There is also deltree if you re on an older version of windows  You can learn more about it from here  SS64  DELTREE - Delete all subfolders and files

User · Answer

admin   takeown  r  f folder cacls folder  c  G  ADMINNAME  F  T rmdir  s folder   Works for anything including sys files  EDIT  I actually found the best way which also solves file path too long problem as well   mkdir  empty robocopy  mir  empty folder

User · Answer

Try this command   del  s foldername

User · Answer

Go to the path and trigger this command   rd  s  q  FOLDER NAME     s   Removes the specified directory and all subdirectories including any files  Use  s to remove a tree    q   Runs rmdir in quiet mode  Deletes directories without confirmation        Displays help at the command prompt

User · Answer

USE AT YOUR OWN RISK  INFORMATION PROVIDED  AS IS   NOT TESTED EXTENSIVELY   Right-click Windows icon  usually bottom left    click  Windows PowerShell  Admin     use this command  with due care  you can easily delete all your files if you re not careful    rd -r -include     -force somedir   Where somedir is the non-empty directory you want to remove   Note that with external attached disks  or disks with issues  Windows sometimes behaves odd - it does not error in the delete  or any copy attempt   yet the directory is not deleted  or not copied  as instructed   I found that in this case  at least for me  the command given by  n y in his answer will produce errors like  get-childitem   The file or directory is corrupted and unreadable   as a result in PowerShell

User · Answer

There is also deltree if you re on an older version of windows  You can learn more about it from here  SS64  DELTREE - Delete all subfolders and files

User · Answer

via Powershell   Remove-Item -Recurse -Force  TestDirectory    via Command Prompt   https   stackoverflow com a 35731786 439130

User · Answer

RMDIR or RD if you are using the classic Command Prompt  cmd exe    rd  s  q  path       RMDIR   S    Q   drive  path      RD   S    Q   drive  path       S Removes all directories and files in the specified directory in addition to the directory itself  Used to remove a directory tree        Q Quiet mode  do not ask if ok to remove a directory tree with  S   If you are using PowerShell you can use Remove-Item  which is aliased to del  erase  rd  ri  rm and rmdir  and takes a -Recurse argument that can be shorted to -r  rd -r  path

User · Answer

You can install cygwin  which has rm as well as ls etc

User · Answer

Using Powershell 5 1   get-childitem  logs  -path    -directory -recurse   remove-item -confirm  false -recurse -force   Replace logs with the directory name you want to delete   get-childitem searches for the children directory with the name recursively from current path       remove-item deletes the result

User · Answer

Here is what you need to do     Create a batch file with the following line  RMDIR  S  1  Save your batch file as Remove bat and put it in C  windows  Create the following registry key  HKEY CLASSES ROOT Directory shell Remove Directory  RMDIR   Launch regedit and update the default value HKEY CLASSES ROOT Directory shell Remove Directory  RMDIR  default with the following value   c  windows REMOVE bat    1   Thats it  Now you can right click any directory and use the RMDIR function

User · Answer

For deleting a directory  whether or not it exists  use the following   if exist myfolder   rmdir  s q myfolder

User · Answer

You can install cygwin  which has rm as well as ls etc

[windows] "rm -rf" equivalent for Windows?

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