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.Dd March 28, 2026
.Dt RMDIR 1
.Os
.Sh NAME
.Nm rmdir
.Nd remove directories
.Sh SYNOPSIS
.Nm /usr/bin/rmdir
.Op Fl ps
.Ar dirname
.Ss "ksh93"
.Nm /usr/bin/rmdir
.Op Fl eps
.Ar dirname ...
.Sh DESCRIPTION
The
.Nm
utility removes the directory entry specified by each
.Ar dirname
operand, which must refer to an empty directory.
.Pp
Directories are processed in the order specified.
If a directory and a subdirectory of that directory are specified in a single
invocation of
.Nm rmdir ,
the subdirectory must be specified before the parent directory so that the
parent directory is empty when
.Nm rmdir
tries to remove it.
.Ss "ksh93"
The
.Nm rmdir
built-in in
.Nm ksh93
is associated with the
.Pa /bin
and
.Pa /usr/bin
paths.
It is invoked when
.Nm rmdir
is executed without a pathname prefix and the pathname search finds a
.Pa /bin/rmdir
or
.Pa /usr/bin/rmdir
executable.
.Sh OPTIONS
The following options are supported for both
.Nm /usr/bin/rmdir
and
.Nm ksh93 rmdir :
.Bl -tag -width Fl
.It Fl p
Allows users to remove the directory
.Ar dirname
and its parent directories which become empty.
A message is printed to standard error if all or part of the path could not be
removed.
.It Fl s
Suppresses the message printed on the standard error when
.Fl p
is in effect.
.El
.Ss "ksh93"
The following options are supported for the
.Nm rmdir
built-in for
.Nm ksh93 :
.Bl -tag -width Fl
.It Fl e , Fl -ignore-fail-on-non-empty
Ignore each non-empty directory failure.
.It Fl -parents
Long option for
.Fl p .
.It Fl -suppress
Long option for
.Fl s .
.El
.Sh OPERANDS
The following operands are supported:
.Bl -tag -width Ar
.It Ar dirname
Specifies the pathname of an empty directory to be removed.
.El
.Sh USAGE
See
.Xr largefile 7
for the description of the behavior of
.Nm rmdir
when encountering files greater than or equal to 2 Gbyte (2^31 bytes).
.Sh EXIT STATUS
The following exit values are returned:
.Bl -tag -width Sy
.It Sy 0
All the existing named directory entries were removed.
.It Sy >0
An error occurred.
.El
.Sh EXAMPLES
.Sy Example 1 No Removing Empty Directories
.Pp
If a directory
.Pa a
in the current directory is empty, except that it contains a directory
.Pa b ,
and
.Pa a/b
is empty except that it contains a directory
.Pa c ,
the following command removes all three directories:
.Pp
.Dl example% rmdir -p a/b/c
.Sh INTERFACE STABILITY
.Sy Committed
.Pp
.Nm ksh93
built-in binding to
.Pa /bin
and
.Pa /usr/bin
is Volatile.
The built-in interfaces are Uncommitted.
.Sh SEE ALSO
.Xr ksh93 1 ,
.Xr rm 1 ,
.Xr unlink 2 ,
.Xr attributes 7 ,
.Xr largefile 7 ,
.Xr standards 7