What commands can be used to list files in a directory? How to list files in Command Prompt Windows 10/11? A lot of people are confused by these questions. In this post, we have explained in detail the topic of the Command Prompt listing files.
CMD (Command Prompt) is a powerful built-in tool for Windows that can be used to perform many tasks such as copying files, listing drives, WiFi passwords, and more. However, a lot of users don't know how to list files in the command prompt. Here's a real-world example from the StackOverflow forum:
I tried searching for a command that lists all the files in the directory as well as subfolders using a command prompt command. I've read the help of the "dir" command but can't find what I'm looking for, please help me implement this with CMD.
Although there have been a lot of discussions and posts about Command Prompt list files, most of them lack clear steps and screenshots, which makes it difficult to understand the operation of "CMD List Files". Therefore, we would like to write a complete guide to explain it. Let's read on.
What commands you can use to list files
In order to list the directory CMD smoothly, you need to know what command you can use to list the files in the Windows directory first. The answer is to use the DIR command. This command can be used to display all files and subfolders in the current directory. In addition, it displays the file name, size, and last modified date of each file, such as File Explorer.
The DIR command works with CMD on almost all Windows systems, including Windows 11/10/8/7/Vista/XP. Here are the most common command lines for CMD list directories/files:
- D: Lists all directories in the current path
- R: Displays read-only files
- H: Show hidden files
- A: Archive file
- S: Lists the system files
- I: No content index file
- L: Reanalyze the point
- -: a prefix indicating no.
How to list files with command prompt in Windows 10/11
How to list files in CMD Windows 10/11? The answer depends on the documents you want to list. Here we have summarized several common examples of Windows Command Prompt listing files.
1. First, you need to navigate to the directory where you want to list the files in File Explorer.
2. Click on the address bar, type cmd in the file path, and then press enter, which will open the command prompt window.
Tip: In addition, you can first find the directory in File Explorer, then press the Win+R keys to open the "Run" box, type cmd in it, and press the enter key to open the "Command Prompt" window.
3. In the pop-up window, you can list the CMD file as you need. For example
CMD lists all directories and folders in the current path
dir 
CMD only lists folders in the current directory
dir /ad CMD only lists files in the directory
dir /a-d CMD lists files and folders in a specific directory (e.g. C:\Usersdefaultuser1)
cd C:\Usersdefaultuser1
dir CMD lists all system files in this directory
dir /s CMD lists all read-only unarchived files
dir /a:r-a CMD lists all files with .doc file extensions.
Tip: You can replace the document with other file extensions, such as exe, png, xml, etc.
dir *.doc CMD lists all files with .doc and .jpg file extensions
dir *.doc *.jpg Of course, there are many other directory commands on Windows 10/11 that are used to list files, and we can't explain everything in this article. If you want to know more about the Windows CMD list file, you can search for the corresponding command online on Google.