Download a Folder from AWS S3
Borislav Hadzhiev
Last updated: Jul 25, 2022
Photo from Unsplash
How to Download a Folder from AWS S3 #
Use the s3 cp command with the --recursive parameter to download an S3
folder to your local file system. The s3 cp command takes the S3 source folder
and the destination directory as inputs and downloads the folder.
Create a folder on your local file system where you'd like to store the downloads from the bucket, open your terminal in that directory and run the s3 cp command.
Let's set the --dryrun parameter to run the command in test mode to verify
everything looks good.
aws s3 cp s3://YOUR_BUCKET/YOUR_FOLDER . --recursive --dryrun
The output of the dry run command shows that everything works as expected.
Now let's run the s3 cp command in real mode to download the contents of the
S3 folder to our local file system.
aws s3 cp s3://YOUR_BUCKET/YOUR_FOLDER . --recursive
YOUR_BUCKET and YOUR_FOLDER placeholders with the bucket and directory names.We set the --recursive parameter in the command. It makes the s3 cp command
applicable to all files under the specified directory.
The . character signifies that the destination of the downloads is the current
directory.
Set Filters when Downloading a Folder from AWS S3 #
Set the --include and --exclude parameters when running the cp command
to filter the files that are downloaded to your local file system from a
bucket.
The default behavior is that all files in the folder are included. For example,
to exclude all files with a .jpg extension from being downloaded, run the
following command:
aws s3 cp s3://YOUR_BUCKET/YOUR_FOLDER . --recursive --exclude "*.jpg"
We can also exclude an entire directory from being downloaded:
aws s3 cp s3://YOUR_BUCKET/YOUR_FOLDER/ . --recursive --exclude "movies/*"
The command excludes all files located in the movies/ directory, e.g.
movies/movie-1.mp4 and movies/movie-2.mp5.
Conversely, to only download .txt files, we have to exclude everything and
include only files with the .txt extension.
aws s3 cp s3://YOUR_BUCKET/YOUR_FOLDER/ . --recursive --exclude "*" --include "*.txt"
Note that the order is important when setting both the --exclude and
--include parameters.
The filters that appear later in the command have higher precedence. For
instance, the following command excludes all files because the --exclude
parameter overrides --include.
aws s3 cp s3://YOUR_BUCKET/YOUR_FOLDER/ . --recursive --include "*.jpg" --exclude "*"
However, if we specify the --include parameter second, we would download all
.jpg files from the specified directory.
aws s3 cp s3://YOUR_BUCKET/YOUR_FOLDER/ . --recursive --exclude "*" --include "*.jpg"
Lastly, we can set the --exclude and --include parameters as many times as
necessary.
For instance, the following command downloads all .jpg and .png files from
the bucket:
aws s3 cp s3://YOUR_BUCKET/YOUR_FOLDER/ . --recursive --exclude "*" --include "*.jpg" --include "*.png"
Further Reading #
- List all Files in an S3 Bucket with AWS CLI
- Get the Size of a Folder in AWS S3 Bucket
- How to Get the Size of an AWS S3 Bucket
- Add a Bucket Policy to an AWS S3 Bucket
- Configure CORS for an AWS S3 Bucket
- Allow Public Read access to an AWS S3 Bucket
- Copy a Local Folder to an S3 Bucket
- How to Rename a Folder in AWS S3
- Copy Files and Folders between S3 Buckets
- How to Delete a Folder from an S3 Bucket
- Count Number of Objects in S3 Bucket
- Download an Entire S3 Bucket - Complete Guide
- AWS CDK Tutorial for Beginners - Step-by-Step Guide
- How to use Parameters in AWS CDK
