---
name: "borg2-export-tar"
section: "1"
platform: "linux"
package: "borgbackup2"
version: "2.0.0b19-1"
release: "Debian 13 (Trixie)"
platforms: ["linux"]
url: "https://new.carta.tech/borg2-export-tar"
---

# borg2-export-tar(1)

Export archive contents as a tarball

## NAME

borg-export-tar - Export archive contents as a tarball

## SYNOPSIS

borg \[common options\] export-tar \[options\] NAME FILE \[PATH...\]

## DESCRIPTION

This command creates a tarball from an archive.

When giving '-' as the output FILE, Borg will write a tar stream to standard output.

By default (**--tar-filter=auto**) Borg will detect whether the FILE should be compressed based on its file extension and pipe the tarball through an appropriate filter before writing it to FILE:

- •

  .tar.gz or .tgz: gzip

- •

  .tar.bz2 or .tbz: bzip2

- •

  .tar.xz or .txz: xz

- •

  .tar.zstd or .tar.zst: zstd

- •

  .tar.lz4: lz4

Alternatively, a **--tar-filter** program may be explicitly specified. It should read the uncompressed tar stream from stdin and write a compressed/filtered tar stream to stdout.

Depending on the **-tar-format** option, these formats are created:

| | | |
| --- | --- | --- |
| --tar-format | Specification | Metadata |
| BORG | BORG specific, like PAX | all as supported by borg |
| PAX | POSIX.1-2001 (pax) format | GNU + atime/ctime/mtime ns + xattrs |
| GNU | GNU tar format | mtime s, no atime/ctime, no ACLs/xattrs/bsdflags |

A **--sparse** option (as found in borg extract) is not supported.

By default the entire archive is extracted but a subset of files and directories can be selected by passing a list of **PATHs** as arguments. The file selection can further be restricted by using the **--exclude** option.

For more help on include/exclude patterns, see the *borg\_patterns* command output.

**--progress** can be slower than no progress display, since it makes one additional pass over the archive metadata.

## OPTIONS

See *[borg-common(1)](/borg-common/1.md)* for common options of Borg commands.

### arguments

- **NAME**

  specify the archive name

- **FILE**

  output tar file. "-" to write to stdout instead.

- **PATH**

  paths to extract; patterns are supported

### options

- **--tar-filter**

  filter program to pipe data through

- **--list**

  output verbose list of items (files, dirs, ...)

- **--tar-format** *FMT*

  select tar format: BORG, PAX or GNU

### Include/Exclude options

- **-e** *PATTERN,* **--exclude** *PATTERN*

  exclude paths matching PATTERN

- **--exclude-from** *EXCLUDEFILE*

  read exclude patterns from EXCLUDEFILE, one per line

- **--pattern** *PATTERN*

  include/exclude paths matching PATTERN

- **--patterns-from** *PATTERNFILE*

  read include/exclude patterns from PATTERNFILE, one per line

- **--strip-components** *NUMBER*

  Remove the specified number of leading path elements. Paths with fewer elements will be silently skipped.

## SEE ALSO

*[borg-common(1)](/borg-common/1.md)*

## AUTHOR

The Borg Collective