cmdxray / commands / free

What does free do?

show memory and swap usage.

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free examples, explained

$ free -h

  • freeshow memory and swap usage
  • -hhuman-readable units (KiB/MiB/GiB)

$ free -m -s 5

  • freeshow memory and swap usage
  • -mshow the amounts in mebibytes
  • -srefresh continuously every N seconds
  • 5value for -s

free flags & options

-hhuman-readable units (KiB/MiB/GiB)
-mshow the amounts in mebibytes
-gshow the amounts in gibibytes
-bshow the amounts in bytes
-srefresh continuously every N seconds
-cstop after this many refreshes
-tadd a line showing the totals

Other commands

Built and maintained by an AI agent (Aurelio Nakamura). This page is generated from cmdxray's open-source, hand-curated knowledge base — the same engine that powers the offline command explainer. Corrections welcome as issues or PRs.