s3cmd

Command-line tool for Amazon S3 management

TLDR

Configure s3cmd (interactive setup)

$ s3cmd --configure

List all buckets

$ s3cmd ls

List contents of a bucket

$ s3cmd ls s3://[bucket_name]

Create a bucket

$ s3cmd mb s3://[bucket_name]

Upload a file

$ s3cmd put [file] s3://[bucket_name]/

Download a file

$ s3cmd get s3://[bucket_name]/[file]

Sync local directory to S3

$ s3cmd sync [local_dir]/ s3://[bucket_name]/[path]/

Delete a file

$ s3cmd del s3://[bucket_name]/[file]

Delete a bucket (must be empty)

$ s3cmd rb s3://[bucket_name]

SYNOPSIS

s3cmd [options] command [parameters]

s3cmd is a command-line tool for managing Amazon S3 and S3-compatible storage services. It provides a familiar interface for uploading, downloading, and managing files in cloud object storage.Configuration is stored in ~/.s3cfg and includes access keys, encryption settings, and default options. Run --configure for interactive setup.The sync command is particularly powerful for backups, mirroring directories to S3 while only transferring changed files. With --delete-removed, it creates exact mirrors.S3cmd supports server-side encryption, multipart uploads for large files, and can work with S3-compatible services like MinIO, DigitalOcean Spaces, and Wasabi.

PARAMETERS

ls [s3://bucket]

List buckets or objects

mb s3://bucket

Make bucket

rb s3://bucket

Remove bucket

put file s3://bucket/path

Upload file

get s3://bucket/path [local]

Download file

del, rm s3://bucket/path

Delete object

sync source dest

Sync directories (local to S3 or S3 to local)

cp src dst

Copy object

mv src dst

Move object

info s3://bucket/object

Get info on bucket or object

du [s3://bucket]

Disk usage

List all objects in all buckets

setacl s3://bucket/object

Modify access control list

signurl s3://bucket/object expiry

Generate time-limited signed URL

restore s3://bucket/object

Restore file from Glacier storage

--configure

Interactive configuration

--recursive, -r

Recursive operation

--delete-removed

Delete files not in source during sync

--dry-run, -n

Show what would be done

--acl-public

Make uploaded files public

--acl-private

Make uploaded files private

--exclude pattern

Exclude files matching pattern

--include pattern

Include files matching pattern

--storage-class CLASS

Set storage class (STANDARD, GLACIER, DEEP_ARCHIVE, etc.)

--server-side-encryption

Use S3-managed server-side encryption

--skip-existing

Skip files that already exist at destination

--verbose, -v

Enable verbose output

--limit-rate RATE

Throttle upload/download speed

--config FILE

Use specified config file instead of ~/.s3cfg

CAVEATS

AWS credentials in ~/.s3cfg should have restricted permissions (600). Never commit credentials to version control.Sync operations compare by size and modification time by default. Use --check-md5 for checksum verification at the cost of speed.Large file uploads automatically use multipart upload. For very large files, increase --multipart-chunk-size-mb.Bucket names must be globally unique across all AWS accounts and follow DNS naming conventions.