leaves

text-mode disk usage treemap visualizer

TLDR

Scan the current directory

$ leaves

Scan a path

$ leaves ~/Documents

Include hidden and ignored files

$ leaves -A /var

Scan root with exclusions for virtual filesystems

$ leaves -A -d 3 / '!/proc' '!/tmp' '!/run' '!/sys' '!/dev'

Open with x-ray mode (group by file type first)

$ leaves -x ~/Projects

SYNOPSIS

leaves [OPTIONS] [PATH] [OVERRIDES...]

leaves is a terminal disk usage analyzer inspired by WinDirStat and QDirStat. After scanning a directory tree, it draws a nested rectangle treemap where area is proportional to size, so large files and directories stand out immediately over SSH or on headless systems where GUI tools are unavailable.The UI combines a collapsible explorer sidebar with a central treemap. Files are colored by extension and directories by name. Keyboard and mouse navigation support focusing into a directory, expanding or deflating detail, and switching x-ray mode (group by file type first). Depth summarization groups small or deep entries so millions of files remain usable.By default, hidden paths and .gitignore / .ignore patterns are skipped. Symbolic links are not followed (they do not add local disk use). Hard links are not de-duplicated and may be counted more than once.

PARAMETERS

PATH

Root path to scan (default: current directory)

OVERRIDES

Git-style globs; prefix with ! to exclude

-d, --max-depth n

Maximum depth kept in memory; deeper trees become summary nodes (default 5)

-x, --xray

Group files by type at the top level, then split by directory

-A, --include-all

Do not automatically skip any files; only overrides apply

-H, --include-hidden

Include hidden files and folders

-I, --include-ignored

Include files matching .ignore rules

-G, --include-gitignored

Include files matching .gitignore rules

-E, --include-gitexcluded

Include files listed in .git/info/exclude

-h, --help

Print help

-V, --version

Print version

CONFIGURATION

Leaves reads $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/leaves/setings.toml (typically ~/.config/leaves/setings.toml on Linux; note the project's spelling). Most settings can also be set via LEAVES_ environment variables.dark_mode (true/false) — lighter colors for dark terminals (LEAVES_DARK_MODE)color_shift (0.0–1.0) — lighten or darken palettes (LEAVES_COLOR_SHIFT)colors — theme name: fall, spring, greys, mono, or a custom theme (LEAVES_COLORS)dir_style — thick or plain directory borders (LEAVES_DIR_STYLE)Custom themes can define dirs and files color arrays (hex, named, rgb/hsl).

CAVEATS

Character-cell treemaps are coarser than GUI tools; deeply nested items are under-represented relative to top-level siblings because borders consume cells. Scanning / without excluding /proc, /sys, /dev, and similar virtual filesystems can produce misleading sizes. Very deep --max-depth loads more of the tree into memory and can slow mode switches.

HISTORY

leaves is a Rust TUI project by patonw, released as free software under the MPL-2.0 license.

RESOURCES

Source code