`wc` command

Count lines, words and bytes.

Text processing
Package coreutils
5 options · 5 examples

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Syntax
Common options
Examples
Guides
Related commands

Syntax

wc [options] [file…]

Provided by the coreutils package. Run man wc for the full manual.

Common options

Option	What it does
`-l`	Count lines
`-w`	Count words
`-c`	Count bytes
`-m`	Count characters
`-L`	Length of the longest line

Examples

Count lines in a file
```
wc -l access.log
```
Count words
```
wc -w essay.txt
```
Count files in a directory
```
ls -1 | wc -l
```
Count matching lines
```
grep "ERROR" app.log | wc -l
```
Lines in every .py file, with a total
```
wc -l *.py
```

wc guides

How to Count Lines in a file in Linux Linux Commands · Updated Apr 2025

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