CARGO-REMOVE(1)

📦 version 1.79.0, in ubuntu jammy, ubuntu noble

💖 CARGO-REMOVE(1) 💖

okay bestie, gather round, because this is the General Commands Manual entry for cargo-remove, and it's lowkey one of the most satisfying little commands in the whole Cargo cinematic universe. no cap.

✨ NAME ✨

cargo-remove — remove dependencies from a Cargo.toml manifest file

it's giving "spring cleaning but make it Rust". 🧹✨

🌸 SYNOPSIS 🌸

cargo remove [options] dependency…

yes queen, you can hand it one dependency or a whole lil squad of them. 💅

🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

Remove one or more dependencies from a Cargo.toml manifest.

that's it. that's the whole vibe. it takes dependency names off your manifest like unfollowing someone who was never really your friend. 😌

🎀 OPTIONS 🎀

Section options

these tell Cargo which section of the manifest you're removing from, iykyk.

To avoid unexpected shell expansions, you may use quotes around each target, e.g., --target 'cfg(unix)'.

fr fr, quote that target. your shell is a drama queen and will absolutely try something. 😭

Miscellaneous Options

the "random but essential" corner of the menu.

  • --dry-run — Don't actually write to the manifest.

it's the "adding to cart but never checking out" of Cargo. ✨

Display Options

how much do you want this command to talk to you?

  • -v, --verbose — Use verbose output. May be specified twice for "very verbose" output which includes extra output such as dependency warnings and build script output. May also be specified with the term.verbose config value (<https://doc.rust-lang.org/cargo/reference/config.html>).
  • -q, --quiet — Do not print cargo log messages. May also be specified with the term.quiet config value (<https://doc.rust-lang.org/cargo/reference/config.html>).
  • --color when — Control when colored output is used. Valid values:
    • auto (default): Automatically detect if color support is available on the terminal.
    • always: Always display colors.
    • never: Never display colors.

May also be specified with the term.color config value (<https://doc.rust-lang.org/cargo/reference/config.html>).

rainbow terminal supremacy 🌈

Manifest Options

where's your manifest, bestie? let's find it. 🕵️‍♀️

  • --manifest-path path — Path to the Cargo.toml file. By default, Cargo searches for the Cargo.toml file in the current directory or any parent directory.
  • --locked — Asserts that the exact same dependencies and versions are used as when the existing Cargo.lock file was originally generated. Cargo will exit with an error when either of the following scenarios arises:
    • The lock file is missing.
    • Cargo attempted to change the lock file due to a different dependency resolution.

It may be used in environments where deterministic builds are desired, such as in CI pipelines.

this is the main character flag for CI. if the lock file ain't matching, Cargo is NOT playing. 💀
  • --offline — Prevents Cargo from accessing the network for any reason. Without this flag, Cargo will stop with an error if it needs to access the network and the network is not available. With this flag, Cargo will attempt to proceed without the network if possible.

Beware that this may result in different dependency resolution than online mode. Cargo will restrict itself to crates that are downloaded locally, even if there might be a newer version as indicated in the local copy of the index. See the cargo-fetch(1) command to download dependencies before going offline.

May also be specified with the net.offline config value (<https://doc.rust-lang.org/cargo/reference/config.html>).

⚠️ different resolution than online mode is a real possibility. it's not a bug, it's just the tradeoff. also go run cargo-fetch(1) before you go offline, bestie. 🍓
  • --frozen — Equivalent to specifying both --locked and --offline.

two flags in a trench coat. iconic. 🧥

Package Selection

  • -p spec…, --package spec… — Package to remove from.

Common Options

the "every cargo command has these" section, and honestly? we stan consistency. 👑

  • +toolchain — If Cargo has been installed with rustup, and the first argument to cargo begins with +, it will be interpreted as a rustup toolchain name (such as +stable or +nightly). See the rustup documentation (<https://rust-lang.github.io/rustup/overrides.html>) for more information about how toolchain overrides work.
  • --config KEY=VALUE or PATH — Overrides a Cargo configuration value. The argument should be in TOML syntax of KEY=VALUE, or provided as a path to an extra configuration file. This flag may be specified multiple times. See the command-line overrides section (<https://doc.rust-lang.org/cargo/reference/config.html#command-line-overrides>) for more information.
  • -C PATH — Changes the current working directory before executing any specified operations. This affects things like where cargo looks by default for the project manifest (Cargo.toml), as well as the directories searched for discovering .cargo/config.toml, for example. This option must appear before the command name, for example cargo -C path/to/my-project build.

This option is only available on the nightly channel (<https://doc.rust-lang.org/book/appendix-07-nightly-rust.html>) and requires the -Z unstable-options flag to enable (see #10098 <https://github.com/rust-lang/cargo/issues/10098>).

🚨 nightly-only AND needs -Z unstable-options. also it has to come before the command name. order matters, no cap.
  • -h, --help — Prints help information.
  • -Z flag — Unstable (nightly-only) flags to Cargo. Run cargo -Z help for details.

🌈 ENVIRONMENT 🌈

See the reference (<https://doc.rust-lang.org/cargo/reference/environment-variables.html>) for details on environment variables that Cargo reads.

⭐ EXIT STATUS ⭐

  • 0: Cargo succeeded. 🎉
  • 101: Cargo failed to complete. 😭

💜 EXAMPLES 💜

okay these are the moment. watch and learn.

  1. Remove regex as a dependency
cargo remove regex
  1. Remove trybuild as a dev-dependency
cargo remove --dev trybuild
  1. Remove nom from the x86_64-pc-windows-gnu dependencies table
cargo remove --target x86_64-pc-windows-gnu nom

see how clean that is? ate and left no crumbs. 🔥

🫶 SEE ALSO 🫶

cargo(1), cargo-add(1)

and that's the whole page, bestie. this was CARGO-REMOVE(1) straight from the Cargo manual pages — thanks for reading the entire thing, you're genuinely the main character for that. now go forth and clean up your Cargo.toml. 💖✨🎀🦋

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