---
name: "smbtar"
section: "1"
platform: "linux"
package: "smbclient"
version: "2:4.25.1-1"
release: "Arch Linux 2026-11-01"
platforms: ["linux"]
url: "https://new.carta.tech/smbtar"
---

# smbtar(1)

shell script for backing up SMB/CIFS shares directly to UNIX tape drives

## NAME

smbtar - shell script for backing up SMB/CIFS shares directly to UNIX tape drives

## SYNOPSIS

smbtar \[-r\] \[-i\] \[-a\] \[-v\] {-s server} \[-p password\] \[-x services\] \[-X\] \[-N filename\] \[-b blocksize\] \[-d directory\] \[-l loglevel\] \[-u user\] \[-t tape\] {filenames}

## DESCRIPTION

This tool is part of the [**samba**(7)](/samba/7.md) suite.

smbtar is a very small shell script on top of [**smbclient**(1)](/smbclient/1.md) which dumps SMB shares directly to tape.

## OPTIONS

- \-s server

  The SMB/CIFS server that the share resides upon.

- \-x service

  The share name on the server to connect to. The default is "backup".

- \-X

  Exclude mode. Exclude filenames... from tar create or restore.

- \-d directory

  Change to initial *directory*  before restoring / backing up files.

- \-v

  Verbose mode.

- \-p password

  The password to use to access a share. Default: none

- \-u user

  The user id to connect as. Default: UNIX login name.

- \-a

  Reset DOS archive bit mode to indicate file has been archived.

- \-t tape

  Tape device. May be regular file or tape device. Default: *$TAPE* environmental variable; if not set, a file called tar.out.

- \-b blocksize

  Blocking factor. Defaults to 20. See [tar(1)](/tar/1.md) for a fuller explanation.

- \-N filename

  Backup only files newer than filename. Could be used (for example) on a log file to implement incremental backups.

- \-i

  Incremental mode; tar files are only backed up if they have the archive bit set. The archive bit is reset after each file is read.

- \-r

  Restore. Files are restored to the share from the tar file.

\-l log level

Log (debug) level. Corresponds to the *-d* flag of [**smbclient**(1)](/smbclient/1.md).

## ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES

The *$TAPE* variable specifies the default tape device to write to. May be overridden with the -t option.

## BUGS

The smbtar script has different options from ordinary tar and from smbclient's tar command.

## CAVEATS

Sites that are more careful about security may not like the way the script handles PC passwords. Backup and restore work on entire shares; should work on file lists. smbtar works best with GNU tar and may not work well with other versions.

## DIAGNOSTICS

See the *DIAGNOSTICS* section for the [**smbclient**(1)](/smbclient/1.md) command.

## VERSION

This man page is part of version 4.25.1 of the Samba suite.

## SEE ALSO

[**smbd**(8)](/smbd/8.md), [**smbclient**(1)](/smbclient/1.md), [**smb.conf**(5)](/smb.conf/5.md).

## AUTHOR

The original Samba software and related utilities were created by Andrew Tridgell. Samba is now developed by the Samba Team as an Open Source project similar to the way the Linux kernel is developed.

Ricky Poulten wrote the tar extension and this man page. The smbtar script was heavily rewritten and improved by Martin Kraemer. Many thanks to everyone who suggested extensions, improvements, bug fixes, etc. The man page sources were converted to YODL format (another excellent piece of Open Source software, available at ftp://ftp.icce.rug.nl/pub/unix/) and updated for the Samba 2.0 release by Jeremy Allison. The conversion to DocBook for Samba 2.2 was done by Gerald Carter. The conversion to DocBook XML 4.2 for Samba 3.0 was done by Alexander Bokovoy.