SHRED(1)

📦
version 9.10 · 5 versions
, in ubuntu stonking

💅 SHRED(1) — bestie edition ✨

okay so this is the shred page from the User Commands section of the manual, and honestly? it's giving "i need this gone gone" 🔥

🌸 NAME 🌸

shred — overwrite a file to hide its contents, and optionally delete it 🫶

✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

shred [OPTION]... FILE...

🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

So here's the tea: shred overwrites the FILE(s) you name, over and over again, so that it's harder for even very expensive hardware probing to get your data back. like, forensic-lab-level expensive. it's giving "good luck bestie" 💀✨

If FILE is -, shred standard output.

Mandatory arguments to long options are mandatory for short options too. (yes that's the rule, no cap, it applies to both.)

🎀 OPTIONS 🎀

  • -f, --force — changes the permissions so writing is allowed, if that's what it takes 💪
  • -n, --iterations=N — overwrite N times instead of the default (3)
  • --random-source=FILE — grab your random bytes from FILE instead
  • -s, --size=N — shred exactly this many bytes (suffixes like K, M, G are accepted, slay)
  • -u — deallocate and remove the file after the overwriting is done
  • --remove[=HOW] — basically -u but you get to control HOW it deletes. see below 👇
  • -v, --verbose — show details of the data and metadata operations performed (so you can watch the magic, iconic)
  • -x, --exact — do not round file sizes up to the next full block; this is the default for non-regular files
  • -z, --zero — add a final overwrite with zeros to hide the shredding 🫣
  • --help — display this help and exit
  • --version — output version information and exit

🧚 THE WHOLE HOW SITUATION 🧚

So the FILE(s) get deleted if --remove (-u) is specified. The default is NOT to remove the files, because it's super common to operate on device files like /dev/hda, and bestie, those files usually should not be removed. 😭

The optional HOW parameter tells it how to remove a directory entry:

  • 'unlink' => use a standard unlink call.
  • 'wipe' => also first obfuscate bytes in the name.
  • 'wipesync' => also sync each obfuscated byte to the device.

The default mode is 'wipesync', but note it can be expensive. 💸 (your wallet is fine, it's your time that's paying.)

🚨 CAUTION, FR FR 🚨

CAUTION: shred assumes the file system and hardware overwrite data in place. Although this is common, many platforms operate otherwise. Also, backups and mirrors may contain unremovable copies that will let a shredded file be recovered later. See the GNU coreutils manual for details. 💀

like, no cap, that's the real warning. read it twice. 🫶

👑 AUTHOR 👑

Written by Colin Plumb. (ty king 🙇‍♀️)

🌈 REPORTING BUGS 🌈

💖 SEE ALSO 💖

  • Full documentation <https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/shred>
  • or available locally via: info '(coreutils) shred invocation'
  • Packaged by Ubuntu (9.10-1ubuntu2)
  • Copyright © 2026 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
  • License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later <https://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>.
  • This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.
  • There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.

and that's the whole page bestie 🎀 this was GNU coreutils 9.10, dated August 2026 — go forth and shred responsibly, mwah 💅✨

📦 where this page comes from