BTRFS-SELECT-SUPER(8)

💅 NAME 💅

btrfs-select-super — overwrite primary superblock with a backup copy

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✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

btrfs-select-super -s number <device>

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🫶 DESCRIPTION 🫶

Okay bestie, listen. This one is destructive — it overwrites all copies of the superblock with a copy you specify. Not one. All of them. It's giving "no undo button, we're doing this live" energy. 💀

But it's also a genuine lifesaver in certain cases, for real:

• when write barriers were disabled during a power failure and not all superblocks got written 🥴
• or if the primary superblock is damaged, like accidentally overwritten 🙈

The filesystem specified by device must not be mounted. Not "probably shouldn't be". It must not. Mounted = no. 🚫

Note: Prior to overwriting the primary superblock, please make sure that the backup copies are valid! Like, actually check. Bestie. Please. 🙏

To dump a superblock, use the btrfs inspect-internal dump-super command. That's the vibe check for your superblocks. 👑

Then run the check (in the non-repair mode) using the command btrfs check -s, where -s specifies the superblock copy to use.

Superblock copies exist in the following offsets on the device:

• primary: 64KiB (65536)
• 1st copy: 64MiB (67108864)
• 2nd copy: 256GiB (274877906944)

A superblock size is 4KiB (4096). Tiny icon for such a big job, honestly. 🎀

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🌸 OPTIONS 🌸

• -s, --super <N> — use the *N*th superblock copy. Valid values are 0, 1, or 2 — but only if the respective superblock offset is actually within the device size. No cheating physics, bestie. 🦋

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🎀 SEE ALSO 🎀

• btrfs(8)

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That's the whole page, babes. Lowestkey one of the scariest tools in the box, so treat it with main character responsibility. 💜

mwah 💋 — this was btrfs-select-super from btrfs 7.3, dated Oct 24, 2026. Slay, go fix that superblock. 🌈✨