Tracking disk usage information is a day-to-day task of any system administrator. Linux has some built-in utilities that help you find the disk space of your system.

  • df command : It displays the amount of disk space used by Linux file systems.
  • du command : It displays the amount of disk space used by files and directories.

In this post, we will show you how to check disk space on Linux using several ways.

Prerequisites

  • A server running Linux operating system.
  • A root password is configured on the server.

Check Disk Space Using the df Command

You can use the df command without any argument to check the disk space usage of mounted file systems.

df

You should se the following output:

Filesystem     1K-blocks     Used Available Use% Mounted on
/dev/sda1      288237920 35699668 237873500  14% /
none                   4        0         4   0% /sys/fs/cgroup
udev             1950372        4   1950368   1% /dev
tmpfs             392664     4548    388116   2% /run
none                5120        0      5120   0% /run/lock
none             1963312   150760   1812552   8% /run/shm
none              102400       48    102352   1% /run/user
/dev/sda5      187308940 37156240 140614908  21% /Data
/dev/loop0         93568    93568         0 100% /snap/core/8592
/dev/loop1        177536   177536         0 100% /snap/skype/112
/dev/loop2         93568    93568         0 100% /snap/core/8689
/dev/loop3         46080    46080         0 100% /snap/gtk-common-themes/1440
/dev/loop4         56064    56064         0 100% /snap/core18/1668
/dev/loop5        177664   177664         0 100% /snap/skype/115
/dev/loop6        164096   164096         0 100% /snap/gnome-3-28-1804/116
/dev/loop7         56832    56832         0 100% /snap/teams-for-linux/79

A brief explanation of each column is shown below:

  • Filesystem: Display the name of the file system partition.
  • 1K-blocks: Display the size of the filesystem in 1K blocks.
  • Used: Display the used space.
  • Available: Display the available space.
  • Use%: Display the used space in percentage.
  • Mounted on: Display the directory on which the filesystem is mounted.

Show Disk Space in Human Readable Format

If you want to display disk space usage in human readable format, use the dh command with h option.

df -h

You should get the following output:

Filesystem      Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/sda1       275G   35G  227G  14% /
none            4.0K     0  4.0K   0% /sys/fs/cgroup
udev            1.9G  4.0K  1.9G   1% /dev
tmpfs           384M  4.7M  379M   2% /run
none            5.0M     0  5.0M   0% /run/lock
none            1.9G  160M  1.8G   9% /run/shm
none            100M   48K  100M   1% /run/user
/dev/sda5       179G   36G  135G  21% /Data
/dev/loop0       92M   92M     0 100% /snap/core/8592
/dev/loop1      174M  174M     0 100% /snap/skype/112
/dev/loop2       92M   92M     0 100% /snap/core/8689
/dev/loop3       45M   45M     0 100% /snap/gtk-common-themes/1440
/dev/loop4       55M   55M     0 100% /snap/core18/1668
/dev/loop5      174M  174M     0 100% /snap/skype/115
/dev/loop6      161M  161M     0 100% /snap/gnome-3-28-1804/116
/dev/loop7       56M   56M     0 100% /snap/teams-for-linux/79

Display File System Type

You can use the df command with the option T to display file system type with other information.

df -T

You should see the following output:

Filesystem     Type     1K-blocks     Used Available Use% Mounted on
/dev/sda1      ext4     288237920 35700492 237872676  14% /
none           tmpfs            4        0         4   0% /sys/fs/cgroup
udev           devtmpfs   1950372        4   1950368   1% /dev
tmpfs          tmpfs       392664     4976    387688   2% /run
none           tmpfs         5120        0      5120   0% /run/lock
none           tmpfs      1963312   223944   1739368  12% /run/shm
none           tmpfs       102400       48    102352   1% /run/user
/dev/sda5      ext4     187308940 37156240 140614908  21% /Data
/dev/loop0     squashfs     93568    93568         0 100% /snap/core/8592
/dev/loop1     squashfs    177536   177536         0 100% /snap/skype/112
/dev/loop2     squashfs     93568    93568         0 100% /snap/core/8689
/dev/loop3     squashfs     46080    46080         0 100% /snap/gtk-common-themes/1440
/dev/loop4     squashfs     56064    56064         0 100% /snap/core18/1668
/dev/loop5     squashfs    177664   177664         0 100% /snap/skype/115
/dev/loop6     squashfs    164096   164096         0 100% /snap/gnome-3-28-1804/116
/dev/loop7     squashfs     56832    56832         0 100% /snap/teams-for-linux/79

To display the information about ext4 partition, run the following command:

df -t ext4

You should see the following output:

Filesystem     1K-blocks     Used Available Use% Mounted on
/dev/sda1      288237920 35700936 237872232  14% /
/dev/sda5      187308940 37156240 140614908  21% /Data

Check Disk Space Usage with du Command

You can also use the du command to check the disk space usage in Linux system.

Run the du command without any argument will display the disk space usage of your current directory:

du

You should see the following output:

308     ./.anydesk/thumbnails
1256    ./.anydesk
164     ./.gftp
4       ./.xx-svn-diff
4       ./Public
4       ./.local/share/folks
12      ./.local/share/data/Nextcloud
16      ./.local/share/data
4       ./.local/share/gstreamer-1.0/presets
8       ./.local/share/gstreamer-1.0
20      ./.local/share/unity-webapps
8       ./.local/share/vlc
4       ./.local/share/evolution/calendar/trash
8       ./.local/share/evolution/calendar/system
16      ./.local/share/evolution/calendar
4       ./.local/share/evolution/mail/trash
8       ./.local/share/evolution/mail
4       ./.local/share/evolution/memos/trash

To display the information in human readable format, run the following command:

du -h

You should see the following output:

308K    ./.anydesk/thumbnails
1.3M    ./.anydesk
164K    ./.gftp
4.0K    ./.xx-svn-diff
4.0K    ./Public
4.0K    ./.local/share/folks
12K     ./.local/share/data/Nextcloud
16K     ./.local/share/data
4.0K    ./.local/share/gstreamer-1.0/presets
8.0K    ./.local/share/gstreamer-1.0
20K     ./.local/share/unity-webapps
8.0K    ./.local/share/vlc
4.0K    ./.local/share/evolution/calendar/trash
8.0K    ./.local/share/evolution/calendar/system
16K     ./.local/share/evolution/calendar

You can use the du command with -hs option to display the total disk space usage of the specified directory.

du -hs /var/log

You should see the following output:

18M	/var/log

You can also use the du command with sort parameter to sort the files and directories by size as shown below:

du -h | sort -rn

You should see the following output:

136K	./master-pdf-editor-4/lang/qt
124K	./master-pdf-editor-5/stamps/Standard
124K	./master-pdf-editor-4/stamps/Standard
80K	./master-pdf-editor-5/templates
80K	./master-pdf-editor-4/templates
77M	./HD-Wallpaper
76K	./master-pdf-editor-5/templates/stamps
76K	./master-pdf-editor-4/templates/stamps
64M	./Mummy
52K	./111
48M	./master-pdf-editor-5
44M	./master-pdf-editor-4
19M	./master-pdf-editor-5/lang
15M	./master-pdf-editor-4/lang
12M	./Webserver

Conclusion

In the above guide, you learned how to check disk space usage with the du and df command. I hope this will help you in your day-to-day task.

How to Check Disk Space on Ubuntu 20.04 ubuntu

About Hitesh Jethva

Over 8 years of experience as a Linux system administrator. My skills include a depth knowledge of Redhat/Centos, Ubuntu Nginx and Apache, Mysql, Subversion, Linux, Ubuntu, web hosting, web server, Squid proxy, NFS, FTP, DNS, Samba, LDAP, OpenVPN, Haproxy, Amazon web services, WHMCS, OpenStack Cloud, Postfix Mail Server, Security etc.