How to check disk space in Linux?

I'm running Linux on my system and need to quickly check my available disk space. What commands or methods can I use to clearly see disk usage?

2 Min

Answer

I ran into this the other day, I needed to check how much space was left on my Linux VPS system, and here’s what worked for me.

View Linux Disk Usage with the df -h Command

First, I used this:

df -h

It shows your drives, how big they are, how much is used, and what’s still free. You’ll get something like:

FS Size Used Free Use% Mount

/dev/sdb1        80G   55G   21G  70% /

Pretty handy.

Want to dig deeper? The Linux manual for df explains all the options in detail.

Then, I wanted to see how much space a specific folder was taking up. For that, this command did the trick:

du -sh /var/log

Mine showed:

2.4G    /var/log

So yeah, 2.4 gigs just for log files. Not bad, but good to know.

Hope that helps. If you’re running out of space, these two commands are lifesavers.

If you have any questions, you can ask

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