Command to list all files in a folder as well as sub-folders in windows

Question

I tried searching for a command that could list all the file in a directory as well as subfolders using a command prompt command. I have read the help for "dir" command but coudn't find what I was looking for. Please help me what command could get this.

Solution 1

The below post gives the solution for your scenario.

dir /s /b /o:gn

---

/S Displays files in specified directory and all subdirectories.

/B Uses bare format (no heading information or summary).

/O List by files in sorted order.

Then in :gn, g sorts by folders and then files, and n puts those files in alphabetical order.

Solution 2

If you want to list folders and files like graphical directory tree, you should use tree command.

tree /f

There are various options for display format or ordering.

Check example output.

Answering late. Hope it help someone.

Solution 3

An addition to the answer: when you do not want to list the folders, only the files in the subfolders, use /A-D switch like this:

dir ..\myfolder /b /s /A-D /o:gn>list.txt

Solution 4

An alternative to the above commands that is a little more bulletproof.

It can list all files irrespective of permissions or path length.

robocopy "C:\YourFolderPath" "C:\NULL" /E /L /NJH /NJS /FP /NS /NC /B /XJ

I have a slight issue with the use of C:\NULL which I have written about in my blog

https://theitronin.com/bulletproofdirectorylisting/

But nevertheless it's the most robust command I know.

Solution 5

If you simply need to get the basic snapshot of the files + folders. Follow these baby steps:

• Press Windows + R
• Press Enter
• Type cmd
• Press Enter
• Type dir -s
• Press Enter

View more solutions

Comments

[Admin]

The below post gives the solution for your scenario. [SubDirectory Files Listing command][1] [1]: stackoverflow.com/questions/3447503/…

[Carey Gregory]

dir /s does the job.

[TaW]

If you are in europe you may want to do a chcp 1252 before any of the below solutions to get our special characters right in windows..

[Jason]

This solution worked great with the added bonus of exporting the list to a .txt file.

[Jimmy Adaro]

Works fine inside of Windows 10 installing window!

[Loufs]

Voted up, cause planet earth is amazing

[Gusdor]

A description of the switches used would greatly improve this answer.

[Ajith]

How to print this to file? I tried >f.txt but not print exact i see

[Rocket Spaceman]

This outputs the path + filename not just the filename. This doesn't work. When recursive /s is added, DIR will always output the full paths in outputs. So a FOR script would likely be needed to recursively find all filenames inside a directory tree and output them in alphabetical order in a text file.

[m-smith]

This is a great option. However, it sadly doesn't seem to work in PowerShell, which means I seem to be unable to use this command on a UNC path.

[tno2007]

Wow, great solution. You literally saved me 25 minutes... to create folders and copy files manually

[Vyren]

Without any arguments, dir only gives information about the files and directories in the current folder, but the OP wants the return to include files in subfolders as well.

[RenniePet]

I know the OP asked for a command, but I'm wondering if you know of a GUI-style way of getting the same tree-like display of directories and files?

[RenniePet]

To answer my own comment, you can use WinDirStat. See here: stackoverflow.com/a/37169035/253938

[Bryan Rayner]

For PowerShell, try dir -s instead of the /s format for flags.

[Muath]

great answer >>>

[SubJunk]

Great answer. In addition to this, because of how difficult it is to do things like copy specific parts of text from a vanilla command prompt, it can be good to append >list.txt to make it output to a file to be more easily used. So the command would be: dir /s /b /o:gn >list.txt

[MGB.py]

@Ajith you need to write the command properly. Example: cd C:\Users\username\Desktop tree /F #Shows the tree only tree /F>C:\Users\username\Desktop\tree.doc #Saves the tree to tree.doc file

[Christian Stengel]

use tree /a /f > output.doc .. to generate the tree as a file

[Zameer Ansari]

@Vyren Thanks a lot for highlighting this! Can you please suggest an edit? I am more than happy for improvements :)

[sj_959]

Found this way to get the relative path (it uses powershell, though) powershell.exe "Get-ChildItem -Recurse . | Resolve-Path -Relative" Courtesy

[Radu Ursache]

this is the way