borg/docs/man/borg-prune.1

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.TH "BORG-PRUNE" "1" "2025-05-22" "" "borg backup tool"
.SH NAME
borg-prune \- Prune repository archives according to specified rules
.SH SYNOPSIS
.sp
borg [common options] prune [options] [NAME]
.SH DESCRIPTION
.sp
The prune command prunes a repository by soft\-deleting all archives not
matching any of the specified retention options.
.sp
Important:
.INDENT 0.0
.IP \(bu 2
The prune command will only mark archives for deletion (\(dqsoft\-deletion\(dq),
repository disk space is \fBnot\fP freed until you run \fBborg compact\fP\&.
.IP \(bu 2
You can use \fBborg undelete\fP to undelete archives, but only until
you run \fBborg compact\fP\&.
.UNINDENT
.sp
This command is normally used by automated backup scripts wanting to keep a
certain number of historic backups. This retention policy is commonly referred to as
GFS <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Backup_rotation_scheme#Grandfather-father-son>

(Grandfather\-father\-son) backup rotation scheme.
.sp
The recommended way to use prune is to give the archive series name to it via the
NAME argument (assuming you have the same name for all archives in a series).
Alternatively, you can also use \-\-match\-archives (\-a), then only archives that
match the pattern are considered for deletion and only those archives count
towards the totals specified by the rules.
Otherwise, \fIall\fP archives in the repository are candidates for deletion!
There is no automatic distinction between archives representing different
contents. These need to be distinguished by specifying matching globs.
.sp
If you have multiple series of archives with different data sets (e.g.
from different machines) in one shared repository, use one prune call per
series.
.sp
The \fB\-\-keep\-within\fP option takes an argument of the form \(dq<int><char>\(dq,
where char is \(dqy\(dq, \(dqm\(dq, \(dqw\(dq, \(dqd\(dq, \(dqH\(dq, \(dqM\(dq, or \(dqS\(dq.  For example,
\fB\-\-keep\-within 2d\fP means to keep all archives that were created within
the past 2 days.  \(dq1m\(dq is taken to mean \(dq31d\(dq. The archives kept with
this option do not count towards the totals specified by any other options.
.sp
A good procedure is to thin out more and more the older your backups get.
As an example, \fB\-\-keep\-daily 7\fP means to keep the latest backup on each day,
up to 7 most recent days with backups (days without backups do not count).
The rules are applied from secondly to yearly, and backups selected by previous
rules do not count towards those of later rules. The time that each backup
starts is used for pruning purposes. Dates and times are interpreted in the local
timezone of the system where borg prune runs, and weeks go from Monday to Sunday.
Specifying a negative number of archives to keep means that there is no limit.
.sp
Borg will retain the oldest archive if any of the secondly, minutely, hourly,
daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, or yearly rules was not otherwise able to
meet its retention target. This enables the first chronological archive to
continue aging until it is replaced by a newer archive that meets the retention
criteria.
.sp
The \fB\-\-keep\-13weekly\fP and \fB\-\-keep\-3monthly\fP rules are two different
strategies for keeping archives every quarter year.
.sp
The \fB\-\-keep\-last N\fP option is doing the same as \fB\-\-keep\-secondly N\fP (and it will
keep the last N archives under the assumption that you do not create more than one
backup archive in the same second).
.sp
You can influence how the \fB\-\-list\fP output is formatted by using the \fB\-\-short\fP
option (less wide output) or by giving a custom format using \fB\-\-format\fP (see
the \fBborg repo\-list\fP description for more details about the format string).
.SH OPTIONS
.sp
See \fIborg\-common(1)\fP for common options of Borg commands.
.SS arguments
.INDENT 0.0
.TP
.B NAME
specify the archive name
.UNINDENT
.SS options
.INDENT 0.0
.TP
.B  \-n\fP,\fB  \-\-dry\-run
do not change repository
.TP
.B  \-\-list
output verbose list of archives it keeps/prunes
.TP
.B  \-\-short
use a less wide archive part format
.TP
.B  \-\-list\-pruned
output verbose list of archives it prunes
.TP
.B  \-\-list\-kept
output verbose list of archives it keeps
.TP
.BI \-\-format \ FORMAT
specify format for the archive part (default: \(dq{archive:<36} {time} [{id}]\(dq)
.TP
.BI \-\-keep\-within \ INTERVAL
keep all archives within this time interval
.TP
.B  \-\-keep\-last\fP,\fB  \-\-keep\-secondly
number of secondly archives to keep
.TP
.B  \-\-keep\-minutely
number of minutely archives to keep
.TP
.B  \-H\fP,\fB  \-\-keep\-hourly
number of hourly archives to keep
.TP
.B  \-d\fP,\fB  \-\-keep\-daily
number of daily archives to keep
.TP
.B  \-w\fP,\fB  \-\-keep\-weekly
number of weekly archives to keep
.TP
.B  \-m\fP,\fB  \-\-keep\-monthly
number of monthly archives to keep
.TP
.B  \-\-keep\-13weekly
number of quarterly archives to keep (13 week strategy)
.TP
.B  \-\-keep\-3monthly
number of quarterly archives to keep (3 month strategy)
.TP
.B  \-y\fP,\fB  \-\-keep\-yearly
number of yearly archives to keep
.UNINDENT
.SS Archive filters
.INDENT 0.0
.TP
.BI \-a \ PATTERN\fR,\fB \ \-\-match\-archives \ PATTERN
only consider archives matching all patterns. see \(dqborg help match\-archives\(dq.
.TP
.BI \-\-oldest \ TIMESPAN
consider archives between the oldest archive\(aqs timestamp and (oldest + TIMESPAN), e.g. 7d or 12m.
.TP
.BI \-\-newest \ TIMESPAN
consider archives between the newest archive\(aqs timestamp and (newest \- TIMESPAN), e.g. 7d or 12m.
.TP
.BI \-\-older \ TIMESPAN
consider archives older than (now \- TIMESPAN), e.g. 7d or 12m.
.TP
.BI \-\-newer \ TIMESPAN
consider archives newer than (now \- TIMESPAN), e.g. 7d or 12m.
.UNINDENT
.SH EXAMPLES
.sp
Be careful, prune is a potentially dangerous command, it will remove backup
archives.
.sp
The default of prune is to apply to \fBall archives in the repository\fP unless
you restrict its operation to a subset of the archives.
.sp
The recommended way to name archives (with \fBborg create\fP) is to use the
identical archive name within a series of archives. Then you can simply give
that name to prune also, so it operates just on that series of archives.
.sp
Alternatively, you can use \fB\-a\fP / \fB\-\-match\-archives\fP to do a match on the
archive names to select some of them.
When using \fB\-a\fP, be careful to choose a good pattern \- e.g. do not use a
prefix \(dqfoo\(dq if you do not also want to match \(dqfoobar\(dq.
.sp
It is strongly recommended to always run \fBprune \-v \-\-list \-\-dry\-run ...\fP
first so you will see what it would do without it actually doing anything.
.sp
Don\(aqt forget to run \fBborg compact \-v\fP after prune to actually free disk space.
.INDENT 0.0
.INDENT 3.5
.sp
.EX
# Keep 7 end of day and 4 additional end of week archives.
# Do a dry\-run without actually deleting anything.
$ borg prune \-v \-\-list \-\-dry\-run \-\-keep\-daily=7 \-\-keep\-weekly=4

# Similar as above but only apply to the archive series named \(aq{hostname}\(aq:
$ borg prune \-v \-\-list \-\-keep\-daily=7 \-\-keep\-weekly=4 \(aq{hostname}\(aq

# Similar as above but apply to archive names starting with the hostname
# of the machine followed by a \(dq\-\(dq character:
$ borg prune \-v \-\-list \-\-keep\-daily=7 \-\-keep\-weekly=4 \-a \(aqsh:{hostname}\-*\(aq

# Keep 7 end of day, 4 additional end of week archives,
# and an end of month archive for every month:
$ borg prune \-v \-\-list \-\-keep\-daily=7 \-\-keep\-weekly=4 \-\-keep\-monthly=\-1

# Keep all backups in the last 10 days, 4 additional end of week archives,
# and an end of month archive for every month:
$ borg prune \-v \-\-list \-\-keep\-within=10d \-\-keep\-weekly=4 \-\-keep\-monthly=\-1
.EE
.UNINDENT
.UNINDENT
.sp
There is also a visualized prune example in \fBdocs/misc/prune\-example.txt\fP\&.
.SH SEE ALSO
.sp
\fIborg\-common(1)\fP, \fIborg\-compact(1)\fP
.SH AUTHOR
The Borg Collective
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