Command to get count of only directories [macOS/Linux/Unix]

In order to just get the count of the number of directories (folders) at a location you would need to use multiple commands in conjunction.

Commands to be used to display the list of files/directories

1. ls -l
2. grep '^d.*'
3. wc -l

If you use the ls command it will just display the list of files and directories at the given location. The trick here is used ls with option -l to display the list in long form.

Example:

ls -l                    
total 0
drwxr-xr-x   7 code2care  staff   224 May 13 19:46 AndroidStudioProjects
drwx------@  3 code2care  staff    96 Feb 13 16:04 Applications
drwxr-xr-x   4 code2care  staff   128 Jan 17 16:16 ClassRoom
drwx------@  9 code2care  staff   288 Jun 26 12:57 Desktop
drwx------@ 13 code2care  staff   416 Jun  5 17:11 Documents
drwx------+ 36 code2care  staff  1152 Jun 26 12:56 Downloads
drwxr-xr-x   9 code2care  staff   288 Apr 24 17:11 IdeaProjects
drwx------@ 76 code2care  staff  2432 Apr 13 16:39 Library
drwx------   6 code2care  staff   192 Mar 20 16:54 Movies
drwx------+  7 code2care  staff   224 Mar 13 22:42 Music
drwx------+  4 code2care  staff   128 Jan  2 23:28 Pictures
drwxr-xr-x+  4 code2care  staff   128 Jan  2 23:03 Public
drwxr-xr-x   6 code2care  staff   192 Jun  5 15:03 PycharmProjects
drwxr-xr-x   4 code2care  staff   128 May 15 12:22 eclipse
drwxr-xr-x   4 code2care  staff   128 May 15 13:07 eclipse-workspace
drwx------  11 code2care  staff   352 Apr  3 14:57 iCloud Drive (Archive)
drwxr-xr-x   2 code2care  staff    64 Jun  5 17:20 myDir
-rw-r--r--   1 code2care  staff     0 Jun  5 17:19 sample.txt

As you can see the all the directories is denoted with a d and file has a - in instead. So you can use a command with grep to only filter those lines that starts with letter d using a regex '^d.*'

code2care@mac ~ % ls -l | grep '^d.*'        
drwxr-xr-x   7 code2care  staff   224 May 13 19:46 AndroidStudioProjects
drwx------@  3 code2care  staff    96 Feb 13 16:04 Applications
drwxr-xr-x   4 code2care  staff   128 Jan 17 16:16 ClassRoom
drwx------@ 10 code2care  staff   320 Jun 26 17:30 Desktop
drwx------@ 13 code2care  staff   416 Jun  5 17:11 Documents
drwx------+ 36 code2care  staff  1152 Jun 26 12:56 Downloads
drwxr-xr-x   9 code2care  staff   288 Apr 24 17:11 IdeaProjects
drwx------@ 76 code2care  staff  2432 Apr 13 16:39 Library
drwx------   6 code2care  staff   192 Mar 20 16:54 Movies
drwx------+  7 code2care  staff   224 Mar 13 22:42 Music
drwx------+  4 code2care  staff   128 Jan  2 23:28 Pictures
drwxr-xr-x+  4 code2care  staff   128 Jan  2 23:03 Public
drwxr-xr-x   6 code2care  staff   192 Jun  5 15:03 PycharmProjects
drwxr-xr-x   4 code2care  staff   128 May 15 12:22 eclipse
drwxr-xr-x   4 code2care  staff   128 May 15 13:07 eclipse-workspace
drwx------  11 code2care  staff   352 Apr  3 14:57 iCloud Drive (Archive)
drwxr-xr-x   2 code2care  staff    64 Jun  5 17:20 myDir

As you can see in the above, now ls along with grep shows only directories.

Now we need to do one more thing, make use of wc command to get the word count.

code2care@mac ~ % ls -l | grep '^d.*' | wc -l
17

Output:

✌️These commands would work on macOS, Linux and Unix Operating systems and Bash for Windows.

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