Bash Command To Check If File Exists

If you are looking for a bash command to check if file exists then you can try the below options,

Option 1: test command with if-then-else-fi

Example:

if test -f my-file.txt; then
    echo "The file exists!"
else
    echo "The file does not exist!"
fi

If you want to look at a specific path,

if test -f /path-to-file/my-file.txt; then
    echo "The file exists!"
else
    echo "The file does not exist!"
fi

Option 2: Using Square Brackets [ ] in one line

[ -f "data.csv" ] && echo "File exists." || echo "File does not exist."

Using [ -f "file-name.extention" ] we check if the file exists or not and accordingly echo the result. You can make it more short with -1 to indicate the file does not exists and 1 if it does.

[ -f "data.csv" ] && echo "1" || echo "-1"

Facing issues? Have Questions? Post them here! I am happy to answer!