rmf

Fast parallel recursive file deletion. A drop-in replacement for rm -rf that uses a thread pool to delete directory trees concurrently.

Installation

From source (requires Rust):

cargo install --path .

Pre-built binaries are available on the Releases page for Linux (x86_64, aarch64, musl), macOS (x86_64, Apple Silicon), and Windows (x86_64, ARM64).

Usage

rmf [OPTIONS] <TARGETS>...

Arguments:
  <TARGETS>              One or more paths to delete

Options:
  -f, --force            Override safety guards (allow deleting protected paths)
      --threads <N>      Number of worker threads [default: number of logical CPUs]
  -q, --quiet            Suppress all output except errors
      --trash            Move to system trash instead of permanent deletion
  -h, --help             Print help
  -V, --version          Print version

Examples

rmf ./node_modules

rmf --threads 8 ./target ./build ./dist

rmf --trash ./old-project

rmf -q ./large-directory

Safety

By default, rmf includes built-in safeguards:

• Filesystem root — Cannot be deleted (even with --force)
• Home directory — Blocked by default; use --force to override

These checks are performed after path canonicalization, preventing bypasses via symlinks or relative paths.

Exit Codes

Code	Meaning
0	All targets deleted successfully
1	One or more files failed to delete
2	Fatal error (protected path, path not found)

License

MIT