Use the Linux cut Command

Syntax

cut [OPTION] [FILE]

OPTION says what to cut and FILE is the input. If you leave out the file, cut reads from a pipe.

Common options

Examples

These examples use a file called file.txt.

Bytes

cut -b 1-5 file.txt

It prints the first 5 bytes of each line.

Characters

cut -c 1 file.txt

Use a range for more characters:

cut -c 1-10 file.txt

Use a comma for several ranges:

cut -c 1-10,20-30 file.txt

Fields with a delimiter

Take the second field of a comma-separated file:

cut -d ',' -f 2 file.txt

Take the second and fourth fields:

cut -d "," -f 2,4 file.txt

Take a range of fields, with a space as the separator:

cut -d " " -f 2-4 file.txt

Change the output separator

cut -d ',' -f 1,2 --output-delimiter=';' file.txt

Skip lines without a delimiter

cut -d "," -s -f 1 file.txt

Use cut after another command

List the user names of the system (the first field of /etc/passwd):

getent passwd | cut -d ':' -f1

Show everything except one field

cut -d ',' --complement -f1 file.txt

For all options, run:

cut --help

Quick recap

• -d sets the separator and -f picks the fields.
• -c picks characters and -b picks bytes.
• Pipe other commands into cut to get a clean list.