borg2-delete(1)

Usage

borg [common options] delete [options] [NAME]

Overview

This command soft-deletes archives from the repository.

Important:

•: The delete command will only mark archives for deletion ("soft-deletion"), repository disk space is not freed until you run borg compact.

•: You can use borg undelete to undelete archives, but only until you run borg compact.

When in doubt, use --dry-run --list to see what would be deleted.

You can delete multiple archives by specifying a matching pattern, using the --match-archives PATTERN option (for more info on these patterns, see borg_patterns).

Options

See borg-common(1) for common options of Borg commands.

arguments

NAME: specify the archive name

options

-n, --dry-run: do not change repository

--list: output verbose list of archives

Archive filters

-a PATTERN, --match-archives PATTERN: only consider archives matching all patterns. see "borg help match-archives".

--sort-by KEYS: Comma-separated list of sorting keys; valid keys are: timestamp, archive, name, id, tags, host, user; default is: timestamp

--first N: consider first N archives after other filters were applied

--last N: consider last N archives after other filters were applied

--oldest TIMESPAN: consider archives between the oldest archive's timestamp and (oldest + TIMESPAN), e.g. 7d or 12m.

--newest TIMESPAN: consider archives between the newest archive's timestamp and (newest - TIMESPAN), e.g. 7d or 12m.

--older TIMESPAN: consider archives older than (now - TIMESPAN), e.g. 7d or 12m.

--newer TIMESPAN: consider archives newer than (now - TIMESPAN), e.g. 7d or 12m.

Examples

# delete all backup archives named "kenny-files":
$ borg delete -a kenny-files
# actually free disk space:
$ borg compact
# delete a specific backup archive using its unique archive ID prefix
$ borg delete aid:d34db33f
# delete all archives whose names begin with the machine's hostname followed by "-"
$ borg delete -a 'sh:{hostname}-*'
# delete all archives whose names contain "-2012-"
$ borg delete -a 'sh:*-2012-*'
# see what would be deleted if delete was run without --dry-run
$ borg delete --list --dry-run -a 'sh:*-May-*'

History

Debian 13 (Trixie): the text shown here
Debian 12 (Bookworm)

--cache-only until Debian 12 (Bookworm); --consider-checkpoints until Debian 12 (Bookworm); --force until Debian 12 (Bookworm); --stats until Debian 12 (Bookworm); -s until Debian 12 (Bookworm).