LINUX COMMAND ATLAS · COMMAND GUIDE

Linux cut command

Extract selected fields or character ranges from each input line.

GNU Coreutils

Syntax

Command form

cut OPTION... [FILE]...

6 options

Option	What it does
`-b, --bytes=LIST`	Select byte positions.
`-c, --characters=LIST`	Select character positions.
`-d, --delimiter=DELIM`	Use DELIM as the field delimiter (default tab).
`-f, --fields=LIST`	Select fields; requires delimiter-separated input.
`-s, --only-delimited`	Skip lines without the delimiter.
`--complement`	Select the complement of the chosen bytes, characters or fields.

3 examples

Extract selected fields or character ranges from each input line.

cut -d, -f1,3 users.csv

Print the first colon-separated field from each line.

cut -d: -f1 /etc/passwd

Print characters 1 through 12 from each line.

cut -c1-12 names.txt

cut works with simple delimiters, not general CSV quoting. Byte and character positions may differ with multibyte encodings.