Curl

This Curl cheat sheet contains commands and examples of some common Curl tricks.

Star on GitHub
...
Follow us on X
Buy Me a Coffee

#Getting Started

#Introduction

Curl is a tool for transferring data between servers, supporting protocols, including:

  • HTTP
  • HTTPS
  • FTP
  • IMAP
  • LDAP
  • POP3
  • SCP
  • SFTP
  • SMB
  • SMTP
  • etc...

#Options

-o <file> # --output: write to file -u user:pass # --user: authentication 
-v # --verbose: Make curl verbose during operation -vv # more verbose -s # --silent: don't show progress meter or errors -S # --show-error: When used with --silent (-sS), show errors but no progress meter 
-i # --include: include HTTP headers in the output -I # --head: header only

#Request

-X POST # --request -L # If the page redirects, follow the link -F # --form: HTTP POST data for multipart/form-data

#data

# --data: HTTP post data # URL encoding (eg, status="Hello") -d 'data' # --data pass file -d @file # --get: send -d data via get -G

#Header information Headers

-A <str> # --user-agent -b name=val # --cookie -b, --cookie FILE # Load cookies from the specified file for the URL -c, --cookie-jar FILE # Save cookies to the specified file from the URL -H "X-Foo: y" # --header --compressed # use deflate/gzip

#SSL

 --cacert <file> --capath <dir> 
-E, --cert <cert> # --cert: client certificate file --cert-type # der/pem/eng -k, --insecure # For self-signed certificates

#Install

apk add --update curl # install in alpine linux

#Example

#CURL GET/HEAD

command description
curl -I https://cheatsheets.zip curl sends a request
curl -v -I https://cheatsheets.zip curl request with details
curl -X GET https://cheatsheets.zip use explicit http method for curl
curl --noproxy 127.0.0.1 http://www.stackoverflow.com curl without http proxy
curl --connect-timeout 10 -I -k https://cheatsheets.zip curl has no timeout by default
curl --verbose --header "Host: www.mytest.com:8182" cheatsheets.zip curl get extra header
curl -k -v https://www.google.com curl get response with headers

#Multiple file upload

$ curl -v --include \ --form key1=value1 \ --form upload=@localfilename URL

#Prettify json output for curl response

$ curl -XGET http://${elasticsearch_ip}:9200/_cluster/nodes | python -m json.tool

#CURL POST

command description
curl -d "name=username&password=123456" <URL> curl send request
curl <URL> -H "content-type: application/json" -d "{ \"woof\": \"bark\"}" curl sends json

#CURL script install rvm

curl -sSL https://get.rvm.io | bash

#CURL Advanced

command description
curl -L -s http://ipecho.net/plain, curl -L -s http://whatismijnip.nl get my public IP
curl -u $username:$password http://repo.dennyzhang.com/README.txt curl with credentials
curl -v -F key1=value1 -F upload=@localfilename <URL> curl upload
curl -k -v --http2 https://www.google.com/ use http2 curl
curl -T cryptopp552.zip -u test:test ftp://10.32.99.187/ curl ftp upload
curl -u test:test ftp://10.32.99.187/cryptopp552.zip -o cryptopp552.zip curl ftp download
curl -v -u admin:admin123 --upload-file package1.zip http://mysever:8081/dir/package1.zip upload with credentials curl

#Check website response time

curl -s -w \ '\nLookup time:\t%{time_namelookup}\nConnect time:\t%{time_connect}\nAppCon time:\t%{time_appconnect}\nRedirect time:\t%{time_redirect}\nPreXfer time:\t%{time_pretransfer }\nStartXfer time:\t%{time_starttransfer}\n\nTotal time:\t%{time_total}\n' \ -o /dev/null https://www.google.com

#Use Curl to check if a remote resource is available

curl -o /dev/null --silent -Iw "%{http_code}" https://example.com/my.remote.tarball.gz

#Downloading file

curl https://example.com | \ grep --only-matching 'src="[^"]*.[png]"' | \ cut -d \" -f2 | \ while read i; do curl https://example.com/"${i}" \ -o "${i##*/}"; done

Download all PNG files from the site (using GNU grep)

#Download the file, save the file without changing its name

curl --remote-name "https://example.com/linux-distro.iso"

Rename file

curl --remote-name "http://example.com/index.html" --output foo.html

#continue partial download

curl --remote-name --continue-at -"https://example.com/linux-distro.iso"

#Download files from multiple domains

curl "https://www.{example,w3,iana}.org/index.html" --output "file_#1.html"

#Download a series of files

curl "https://{foo,bar}.com/file_[1-4].webp" --output "#1_#2.webp"

Download a series of files (output foo_file1.webp, foo_file2.webp...bar_file1_webp, etc.)

#Redirect output to file

$ curl http://url/file > file

#Basic Authentication

$ curl --user username:password http://example.com/ $ curl -u username:password http://example.com/

#Write to file instead of stdout

$ curl -o file http://url/file $ curl --output file http://url/file

#Download header information

$ curl -I url # display header information

#Write output to a file named remote_file

$ curl -o file http://url/file $ curl --output file http://url/file

#Execute remote script

$ curl -s http://url/myscript.sh

#Configuration file

curl -K file # read configuration from file curl --config file $HOME/.curlrc # default configuration file on UNIX-like systems