/rclone_copyto

title: "rclone copyto"
description: "Copy files from source to dest, skipping identical files."
versionIntroduced: v1.35
# autogenerated - DO NOT EDIT, instead edit the source code in cmd/copyto/ and as part of making a release run "make commanddocs"

> **Official documentation:** [https://rclone.org/commands/rclone_copyto/](https://rclone.org/commands/rclone_copyto/)

rclone copyto

Copy files from source to dest, skipping identical files.

Synopsis

If source:path is a file or directory then it copies it to a file or directory named dest:path.

This can be used to upload single files to other than their current name. If the source is a directory then it acts exactly like the [copy](/commands/rclone_copy/) command.

So

rclone copyto src dst

where src and dst are rclone paths, either `remote:path` or `/path/to/local` or `C:\windows\path\if\on\windows`.

This will:

if src is file
    copy it to dst, overwriting an existing file if it exists
if src is directory
    copy it to dst, overwriting existing files if they exist
    see copy command for full details

This doesn't transfer files that are identical on src and dst, testing by size and modification time or MD5SUM. It doesn't delete files from the destination.

*If you are looking to copy just a byte range of a file, please see `rclone cat --offset X --count Y`.*

**Note**: Use the `-P`/`--progress` flag to view real-time transfer statistics.

Logger Flags

The `--differ`, `--missing-on-dst`, `--missing-on-src`, `--match` and `--error` flags write paths, one per line, to the file name (or stdout if it is `-`) supplied. What they write is described in the help below. For example `--differ` will write all paths which are present on both the source and destination but different.

The `--combined` flag will write a file (or stdout) which contains all file paths with a symbol and then a space and then the path to tell you what happened to it. These are reminiscent of diff files.

• `= path` means path was found in source and destination and was identical
• `- path` means path was missing on the source, so only in the destination
• `+ path` means path was missing on the destination, so only in the source
• `* path` means path was present in source and destination but different.
• `! path` means there was an error reading or hashing the source or dest.

The `--dest-after` flag writes a list file using the same format flags as [`lsf`](/commands/rclone_lsf/#synopsis) (including [customizable options for hash, modtime, etc.](/commands/rclone_lsf/#synopsis)) Conceptually it is similar to rsync's `--itemize-changes`, but not identical -- it should output an accurate list of what will be on the destination after the command is finished.

When the `--no-traverse` flag is set, all logs involving files that exist only on the destination will be incomplete or completely missing.

Note that these logger flags have a few limitations, and certain scenarios are not currently supported:

• `--max-duration` / `CutoffModeHard`
• `--compare-dest` / `--copy-dest`
• server-side moves of an entire dir at once
• High-level retries, because there would be duplicates (use `--retries 1` to disable)
• Possibly some unusual error scenarios

Note also that each file is logged during execution, as opposed to after, so it is most useful as a predictor of what SHOULD happen to each file (which may or may not match what actually DID).

rclone copyto source:path dest:path [flags]

Options

      --absolute                Put a leading / in front of path names
      --combined string         Make a combined report of changes to this file
      --csv                     Output in CSV format
      --dest-after string       Report all files that exist on the dest post-sync
      --differ string           Report all non-matching files to this file
  -d, --dir-slash               Append a slash to directory names (default true)
      --dirs-only               Only list directories
      --error string            Report all files with errors (hashing or reading) to this file
      --files-only              Only list files (default true)
  -F, --format string           Output format - see lsf help for details (default "p")
      --hash h                  Use this hash when h is used in the format MD5|SHA-1|DropboxHash (default "md5")
  -h, --help                    help for copyto
      --match string            Report all matching files to this file
      --missing-on-dst string   Report all files missing from the destination to this file
      --missing-on-src string   Report all files missing from the source to this file
  -s, --separator string        Separator for the items in the format (default ";")
  -t, --timeformat string       Specify a custom time format - see docs for details (default: 2006-01-02 15:04:05)

Options shared with other commands are described next. See the [global flags page](/flags/) for global options not listed here.

Copy Options

Flags for anything which can copy a file

      --check-first                                 Do all the checks before starting transfers
  -c, --checksum                                    Check for changes with size & checksum (if available, or fallback to size only)
      --compare-dest stringArray                    Include additional server-side paths during comparison
      --copy-dest stringArray                       Implies --compare-dest but also copies files from paths into destination
      --cutoff-mode HARD|SOFT|CAUTIOUS              Mode to stop transfers when reaching the max transfer limit HARD|SOFT|CAUTIOUS (default HARD)
      --ignore-case-sync                            Ignore case when synchronizing
      --ignore-checksum                             Skip post copy check of checksums
      --ignore-existing                             Skip all files that exist on destination
      --ignore-size                                 Ig