Linux Basic Commands

13. touch

touch Command in Linux

The touch command is used to:

1. Create an empty file.

2. Update the timestamp of an existing file (access and modification time).

---

📌 Syntax:

touch filename

---

🔹 1. Create a New Empty File

touch myfile.txt

🟢 This creates an empty file named myfile.txt in the current directory.

---

🔹 2. Create Multiple Files at Once

touch file1.txt file2.txt file3.txt

🟢 This creates all three files in one command.

---

🔹 3. Update Timestamp of Existing File

touch existingfile.txt

🟢 If existingfile.txt already exists, touch will not delete it — it simply updates the last modified time to the current time.

---

🔹 4. Change Timestamp to Specific Time

touch -t 202507011200 myfile.txt

🟢 This sets the time to 1st July 2025, 12:00 PM.

---

🔹 5. Don’t Create New File (Only Update if Exists)

touch -c myfile.txt

🟢 If the file doesn’t exist, it does nothing.

---

✅ Summary Table

Command	Description
touch newfile.txt	Create a new empty file
touch file1 file2 file3	Create multiple files
touch existing.txt	Update modified time of existing file
touch -t YYYYMMDDhhmm file	Set custom timestamp
touch -c file	Update time only if file exists

Try with Linux Practice