df

Updated

July 31, 2026

Overview

df reports filesystem disk space usage for mounted filesystems. Use it for “is the disk full?” before diving into per-directory du.

Syntax

df [options] [file...]

Common Options

Option Description
-h Human-readable powers of 1024
-H Powers of 1000
-T Print filesystem type
-i Inode usage instead of blocks
-l Local filesystems only
--output= Select columns (GNU)
-t type / -x type Include/exclude type

Examples with Explanations

Human overview

df -h
df -hT

Inodes exhausted?

df -ih

Many small files can fill inodes while df -h still shows free space.

Specific path

df -h /var
df -h .

Shows the filesystem containing that path.

Portable script columns

df -P / | tail -1

Exclude tmpfs noise

df -h -x tmpfs -x devtmpfs

Understanding Output

  • Size/Used/Avail/Use% — block capacity
  • Mounted on — mountpoint
  • 100% Use may still allow root-reserved space on ext*