sync(1) — Arch manual pages

SYNC(1) User Commands SYNC(1)

NAME

sync - Synchronize cached writes to persistent storage

SYNOPSIS

sync [OPTION] [FILE]...

DESCRIPTION

Synchronize cached writes to persistent storage

If one or more files are specified, sync only them, or their containing file systems.

-d, --data
sync only file data, no unneeded metadata
-f, --file-system
sync the file systems that contain the files
--help
display this help and exit
--version
output version information and exit

BUGS

Persistence guarantees vary per system. See the system calls below for more details.

Written by Jim Meyering and Giuseppe Scrivano.

REPORTING BUGS

Report bugs to: bug-coreutils@gnu.org
GNU coreutils home page: https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/
General help using GNU software: https://www.gnu.org/gethelp/
Report any translation bugs to https://translationproject.org/team/

Copyright © 2026 Free Software Foundation, Inc. License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later https://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html.
This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it. There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.

SEE ALSO

fdatasync(2), fsync(2), sync(2), syncfs(2)

Full documentation https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/sync
or available locally via: info '(coreutils) sync invocation'