split(1) - Linux manual page
Archived: 2026-04-05 19:00:17 UTC
SPLIT(1) User Commands SPLIT(1)
NAME         top
 split - split a file into pieces
SYNOPSIS         top
 split [OPTION]... [FILE [PREFIX]]
DESCRIPTION         top
 Output pieces of FILE to PREFIXaa, PREFIXab, ...; default size is
 1000 lines, and default PREFIX is 'x'.
 With no FILE, or when FILE is -, read standard input.
 Mandatory arguments to long options are mandatory for short
 options too.
 -a, --suffix-length=N
 generate suffixes of length N (default 2)
 --additional-suffix=SUFFIX
 append an additional SUFFIX to file names
 -b, --bytes=SIZE
 put SIZE bytes per output file
 -C, --line-bytes=SIZE
 put at most SIZE bytes of records per output file
 -d use numeric suffixes starting at 0, not alphabetic
 --numeric-suffixes[=FROM]
 same as -d, but allow setting the start value
https://man7.org/linux/man-pages/man1/split.1.html
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-x use hex suffixes starting at 0, not alphabetic
 --hex-suffixes[=FROM]
 same as -x, but allow setting the start value
 -e, --elide-empty-files
 do not generate empty output files with '-n'
 --filter=COMMAND
 write to shell COMMAND; file name is $FILE
 -l, --lines=NUMBER
 put NUMBER lines/records per output file
 -n, --number=CHUNKS
 generate CHUNKS output files; see explanation below
 -t, --separator=SEP
 use SEP instead of newline as the record separator; '\0'
 (zero) specifies the NUL character
 -u, --unbuffered
 immediately copy input to output with '-n r/...'
 --verbose
 print a diagnostic just before each output file is opened
 --help display this help and exit
 --version
 output version information and exit
 The SIZE argument is an integer and optional unit (example: 10K is
 10*1024). Units are K,M,G,T,P,E,Z,Y,R,Q (powers of 1024) or
 KB,MB,... (powers of 1000). Binary prefixes can be used, too:
 KiB=K, MiB=M, and so on.
 CHUNKS may be:
 N split into N files based on size of input
 K/N output Kth of N to standard output
 l/N split into N files without splitting lines/records
 l/K/N output Kth of N to standard output without splitting
 lines/records
https://man7.org/linux/man-pages/man1/split.1.html
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r/N like 'l' but use round robin distribution
 r/K/N likewise but only output Kth of N to standard output
AUTHOR top
 Written by Torbjorn Granlund and Richard M. Stallman.
REPORTING BUGS top
 Report bugs to: bug-coreutils@gnu.org
 GNU coreutils home page: General help using GNU software: Report any translation bugs to COPYRIGHT top
 Copyright © 2025 Free Software Foundation, Inc. License GPLv3+:
 GNU GPL version 3 or later .
 This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.
 There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.
SEE ALSO top
 Full documentation or available locally via: info '(coreutils) split invocation'
COLOPHON top
 This page is part of the coreutils (basic file, shell and text
 manipulation utilities) project. Information about the project
 can be found at ⟨http://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/⟩. If you
 have a bug report for this manual page, see
 ⟨http://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/⟩. This page was obtained
 from the tarball coreutils-9.9.tar.xz fetched from
 ⟨http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/coreutils/⟩ on 2026-01-16. If you
 discover any rendering problems in this HTML version of the page,
 or you believe there is a better or more up-to-date source for the
 page, or you have corrections or improvements to the information
https://man7.org/linux/man-pages/man1/split.1.html
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in this COLOPHON (which is not part of the original manual page),
 send a mail to man-pages@man7.org
GNU coreutils 9.9 November 2025 SPLIT(1)
Source: https://man7.org/linux/man-pages/man1/split.1.html
https://man7.org/linux/man-pages/man1/split.1.html
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