---
name: "plutil"
section: "1"
platform: "linux"
package: "gnustep-base"
version: "1.31.1-3"
release: "Arch Linux 2026-11-01"
platforms: ["linux"]
url: "https://new.carta.tech/plutil"
---

# plutil(1)

Property list utility

## NAME

**plutil** – Property list utility

## SYNOPSIS

**progname** \[**-command**\] \[**-options**\] *file*

## DESCRIPTION

The **plutil** utility can be used to edit property lists, to verify the syntax, or to convert from one format to another. If ‘-’ is given as the file path, stdin and stdout are used.

The first part is the action to perform, one of:

- \-p

  Print the whole plist to stdout, in the human-readable GNUStep format.

- \-lint

  Verifies the plist can be parsed.

- \-convert *FMT*

  Converts the plist to another format. ‘FMT’ can be one of:

  - xml1

    Apple XML.

  - binary1

    Apple binary.

  - openstep

    OpenStep (untyped human-readable).

  - gnustep

    GNUStep (typed human-readable).

  - json

    JSON (lossy human-readable).

    The NSPropertyListFormat names are accepted too.

- \-insert *PATH* *KEY* *Value*

  The default action is ‘-lint.’

The general options are:

The plutil "keypath" is a dot-separated chain of keys for traversing a plist object. An empty keypath refers to the object itself. The format of keys conform to that of GNUStep plist string literals.

## IMPLEMENTATION NOTES

-

  Quoted strings in the keypath is a GNUStep extension.

-

  The Objective-C and Swift literal output formats are not yet implemented.

## EXIT STATUS

## EXAMPLES

## DIAGNOSTICS

## SEE ALSO

[pl(1)](/pl/1.md) [pldes(1)](/pldes/1.md)

## AUTHORS

This version of **plutil** was written by Mingye Wang ⟨*arthur2e5@aosc.io*⟩. **plutil** first appeared in Mac OS X 10.2. It received path-related capabilities around Mac OS X 10.13.