I am interested in rendering a torrent file into a readable form (to see what files does it reference, what tracker information does it contain etc.). What a tool can I use to do just this?
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8 Answers
You can use transmission-show, included in the Gnome Transmission BitTorrent client.
$ transmission-show amd64cd-5.1.2.iso.torrent Name: amd64cd-5.1.2.iso File: amd64cd-5.1.2.iso.torrent GENERAL Name: amd64cd-5.1.2.iso Hash: e30c05f2330ba4869eefb90bf5978a505303b235 Created by: Created on: Sun Feb 5 01:31:29 2012 Piece Count: 967 Piece Size: 256.0 KiB Total Size: 253.3 MB Privacy: Public torrent TRACKERS Tier #1 http://tracker.netbsd.org:6969/announce FILES amd64cd-5.1.2.iso (253.3 MB) If you're using an older version of Transmission, you can use the older transmissioncli --info command:
$ transmissioncli --info amd64cd-5.1.2.iso.torrent Transmission 2.03 (11030) - http://www.transmissionbt.com/ hash: e30c05f2330ba4869eefb90bf5978a505303b235 name: amd64cd-5.1.2.iso tracker tier #1: announce: http://tracker.netbsd.org:6969/announce size: 253325312 (966 * 262144 + 94208) file(s): amd64cd-5.1.2.iso (253325312) 
- -1 my version of transmission-cli (2.51 Debian testing amd64) does not have this optionixtmixilix– ixtmixilix2012-05-17 23:48:44 +00:00Commented May 17, 2012 at 23:48
- @ixtmixilix: Answer updated to use new "transmission-show" command.Teddy– Teddy2012-05-24 16:54:19 +00:00Commented May 24, 2012 at 16:54
- 4For archlinux users, this is in extra/ as of April 2017. Winuser3356– user33562017-04-09 21:51:06 +00:00Commented Apr 9, 2017 at 21:51
- 1Is there a way to get
transmission-showoutput to include exact file size? Useful to see if 2 torrents of the same thing might not be the exact same file after all.Peter Cordes– Peter Cordes2019-10-04 19:55:51 +00:00Commented Oct 4, 2019 at 19:55 - Very good works as expected!Smeterlink– Smeterlink2023-06-21 19:12:17 +00:00Commented Jun 21, 2023 at 19:12
You can use aria2. From the aria2c(1) man page:
-S, --show-files[=true|false]Print file listing of ".torrent", ".meta4" and ".metalink" file and exit. In case of ".torrent" file, additional information (infohash, piece length, etc) is also printed.
$ aria2c -S ubuntu-14.04.2-desktop-i386.iso.torrent >>> Printing the contents of file 'ubuntu-14.04.2-desktop-i386.iso.torrent'... *** BitTorrent File Information *** Comment: Ubuntu CD releases.ubuntu.com Creation Date: Thu, 19 Feb 2015 22:17:32 GMT Mode: single Announce: http://torrent.ubuntu.com:6969/announce http://ipv6.torrent.ubuntu.com:6969/announce Info Hash: 33678ec8b0dfb8a9061348c8af7194268c0b8310 Piece Length: 512KiB The Number of Pieces: 2006 Total Length: 0.9GiB (1,051,721,728) Name: ubuntu-14.04.2-desktop-i386.iso Magnet URI: magnet:?xt=urn:btih:33678EC8B0DFB8A9061348C8AF7194268C0B8310&dn=ubuntu-14.04.2-desktop-i386.iso&tr=http%3A%2F%2Ftorrent.ubuntu.com%3A6969%2Fannounce&tr=http%3A%2F%2Fipv6.torrent.ubuntu.com%3A6969%2Fannounce Files: idx|path/length ===+=========================================================================== 1|./ubuntu-14.04.2-desktop-i386.iso |0.9GiB (1,051,721,728) ---+---------------------------------------------------------------------------
- 1it support glob pattern,
aria2c -S *.torrentworks.Aobo Cheng– Aobo Cheng2019-08-16 11:08:50 +00:00Commented Aug 16, 2019 at 11:08 - 2@ObooCheng Actually, it's the shell that expands the glob pattern, not aria2c.Niklas Holm– Niklas Holm2020-08-14 07:55:19 +00:00Commented Aug 14, 2020 at 7:55
- Useful, as this is an app which works on my OSes.Jiri B– Jiri B2021-03-23 10:01:54 +00:00Commented Mar 23, 2021 at 10:01
btshowmetainfo, formerly included in the BitTorrent distribution but now largely installed with BitTornado (a fork of the BitTorrent 3.x codebase), does just that.
$ btshowmetainfo amd64cd-5.1.2.iso.torrent btshowmetainfo 20030621 - decode BitTorrent metainfo files metainfo file.: amd64cd-5.1.2.iso.torrent info hash.....: e30c05f2330ba4869eefb90bf5978a505303b235 file name.....: amd64cd-5.1.2.iso file size.....: 253325312 (966 * 262144 + 94208) announce url..: http://tracker.netbsd.org:6969/announce 
- 6You can clone
https://github.com/effigies/BitTornadoand runpython3 btshowmetainfo.pyto run the script, since BitTornado seems long-since abandoned.zymhan– zymhan2016-12-09 14:01:42 +00:00Commented Dec 9, 2016 at 14:01
lstor, including the ability to calculate the hash, which can be quite useful in shell scripts:
$ lstor Chakra\ 2012.02\ Archimedes\ x86.torrent -qo __hash__ B3472076574BC666396766AB3B28C0054D740B46 $ lstor Chakra\ 2012.02\ Archimedes\ x86.torrent -q NAME Chakra 2012.02 Archimedes x86.torrent SIZE 1.4 GiB (1461 * 1.0 MiB + 0 bytes) HASH B3472076574BC666396766AB3B28C0054D740B46 URL http://linuxtracker.org:2710/********************************/announce PRV YES (DHT/PEX disabled) TIME 2012-02-13 17:10:28 BY qBittorrent v2.9.3 FILE LISTING chakra-2012.02-Archimedes-i686.iso 1.4 GiB $ lstor Chakra\ 2012.02\ Archimedes\ x86.torrent -q --raw {'announce': 'http://linuxtracker.org:2710/********************************/announce', 'created by': 'qBittorrent v2.9.3', 'creation date': 1329149428, 'info': {'length': 1531969536, 'name': 'chakra-2012.02-Archimedes-i686.iso', 'piece length': 1048576, 'pieces': '<1461 piece hashes>', 'private': 1}, 'url-list': ''} 
You can use torrenttools.
torrenttools info test.torrent
Metafile: /home/fbdtemme/Downloads/Fedora-Workstation-Live-x86_64-33.torrent Protocol version: v1 Infohash: 7707056a138a00dd9b9eff4fab29f46233e2bad9 Piece size: 256 KiB (262144 bytes) Created by: Created on: 2020-10-26 15:52:05 UTC Private: false Name: Fedora-Workstation-Live-x86_64-33 Source: Comment: Announces: tier 1 - http://torrent.fedoraproject.org:6969/announce Files: Fedora-Workstation-Live-x86_64-33 ├── [1.04 KiB] Fedora-Workstation-33-1.2-x86_64-CHECKSUM └── [1.91 GiB] Fedora-Workstation-Live-x86_64-33-1.2.iso 1.91 GiB in 0 directories, 2 files You can also retrieve specific fields only which can be useful in shell scripts.
torrenttools show infohash test.torrent
17ebe3685a498afcc06e2241e875a1726e7c38c2 torrenttools show announce Fedora-Workstation-Live-x86_64-33.torrent
http://torrent.fedoraproject.org:6969/announce It can be useful to view the decoded torrent file in json format.
torrenttools info --raw Fedora-Workstation-Live-x86_64-33.torrent
{ "announce": "http://torrent.fedoraproject.org:6969/announce", "creation date": 1603727525, "info": { "files": [ { "length": 1062, "path": [ "Fedora-Workstation-33-1.2-x86_64-CHECKSUM" ] }, { "length": 2049490944, "path": [ "Fedora-Workstation-Live-x86_64-33-1.2.iso" ] } ], "name": "Fedora-Workstation-Live-x86_64-33", "piece length": 262144, "pieces": "<7819 piece hashes>" } } You can expand the pieces field with the --show-pieces options.
torrenttools info --raw --show-pieces Fedora-Workstation-Live-x86_64-33.torrent
{ "announce": "http://torrent.fedoraproject.org:6969/announce", "creation date": 1603727525, "info": { "files": [ { "length": 1062, "path": [ "Fedora-Workstation-33-1.2-x86_64-CHECKSUM" ] }, { "length": 2049490944, "path": [ "Fedora-Workstation-Live-x86_64-33-1.2.iso" ] } ], "name": "Fedora-Workstation-Live-x86_64-33", "piece length": 262144, "pieces": [ "<piece: 0, SHA1: 52095a748e9337d31631fce7fe6d7d5a40f60352>", "<piece: 1, SHA1: 5a241db1f3d0e6b794d04594253b5c1931cacafe>", "<piece: 2, SHA1: 06adbe76ca7764c142fd2c00f57fab5dc7667171>", "<piece: 3, SHA1: 40893918608f042fe41abcc4e4f4e04f92ad3665>", "<piece: 4, SHA1: 0b491f424e765b64ef38329e1935bd2c3ceff4e0>", "<piece: 5, SHA1: deffa6b0a4ca6b11b04caa785a4ef80b0ee4a238>", ... torrenttools can also work with the new BitTorrent v2 metafiles and hybrid torrents.
torrenttools info bittorrent-v2-hybrid-test.torrent
Metafile: /home/fbdtemme/Documents/project/torrent/torrenttools/tests/resources/bittorrent-v2-hybrid-test.torrent Protocol version: v1 + v2 (hybrid) Infohash: v1: 8c9a2f583949c757c32e085413b581067eed47d0 v2: d8dd32ac93357c368556af3ac1d95c9d76bd0dff6fa9833ecdac3d53134efabb Piece size: 512 KiB (524288 bytes) Created by: libtorrent Created on: 2020-06-03 08:45:06 UTC Private: false Name: bittorrent-v1-v2-hybrid-test Source: Comment: Announces: Files: bittorrent-v1-v2-hybrid-test ├── [6.23 MiB] Darkroom (Stellar, 1994, Amiga ECS) HQ.mp4 ├── [19.6 MiB] Spaceballs-StateOfTheArt.avi ├── [ 326 MiB] cncd_fairlight-ceasefire_(all_falls_down)-1080p.mp4 ├── [58.8 MiB] eld-dust.mkv ├── [ 265 MiB] fairlight_cncd-agenda_circling_forth-1080p30lq.mp4 ├── [42.5 MiB] meet the deadline - Still _ Evoke 2014.mp4 ├── [61.0 B] readme.txt ├── [25.1 MiB] tbl-goa.avi └── [ 111 MiB] tbl-tint.mpg 854.06 MiB in 0 directories, 9 files Disclaimer: I am the author of this tool.
For more information see:
- torrenttools is broken and unmaintained, see for example this issuemilahu– milahu2024-12-08 09:56:09 +00:00Commented Dec 8, 2024 at 9:56
exiftool can show basic information and list the files:
$ exiftool my.torrent ExifTool Version Number : 10.20 File Name : my.torrent ... Announce : udp://ammounce.url:80/announce Create Date : 2023:01:15 04:00:00+01:00 File 1 Length : 15 MB File 1 Path : afile.zip File 2 Length : 33 MB File 2 Length : anotherfile.zip ... Name : some-random-files Piece Length : 16777200 Pieces : (Binary data 161000 bytes, use option -b to extract) 
You can use Torrent File Editor 
(source: fsdn.com)
Also .torrent file can be converted to .json format with command line --to-json.
Use btshowmetainfo.py from https://github.com/effigies/BitTornado. Clone it and run python3 btshowmetainfo.py file.torrent to run the script.
For, convenience, I created a container for it. Example usage:
wget https://releases.ubuntu.com/20.04/ubuntu-20.04.2-live-server-amd64.iso.torrent docker run \ --rm \ --volume "$(pwd)/ubuntu-20.04.2-live-server-amd64.iso.torrent:/a.torrent" \ btshowmetainfo/btshowmetainfo gives
btshowmetainfo 20130326 - decode BitTorrent metainfo files metainfo file.: a.torrent info hash.....: 126f82fb33119d2acf93a16cfba6eb1c5787a59f file name.....: ubuntu-20.04.2-live-server-amd64.iso file size.....: 1215168512 (4635 * 262144 + 131072) announce url..: https://torrent.ubuntu.com/announce announce-list.: https://torrent.ubuntu.com/announce|https://ipv6.torrent.ubuntu.com/announce comment.......: Ubuntu CD releases.ubuntu.com See:
