basenc(1)

basenc1

Encode/decode data and print to standard output

Usage

basenc [OPTION] ... [FILE]

Overview

basenc encode or decode FILE, or standard input, to standard output.

With no FILE, or when FILE is -, read standard input.

Mandatory arguments to long options are mandatory for short options too.

--base64

same as base64(1) program (RFC4648 section 4)

--base64url

file- and url-safe base64 (RFC4648 section 5)

--base58

visually unambiguous base58 encoding

--base32

same as base32(1) program (RFC4648 section 6)

--base32hex

extended hex alphabet base32 (RFC4648 section 7)

--base16

hex encoding (RFC4648 section 8)

--base2msbf

bit string with most significant bit (msb) first

--base2lsbf

bit string with least significant bit (lsb) first

-d, --decode

decode data

-i, --ignore-garbage

when decoding, ignore non-alphabet characters

-w, --wrap=COLS

wrap encoded lines after COLS character (default 76). Use 0 to disable line wrapping

--z85

ascii85-like encoding (ZeroMQ spec:32/Z85); when encoding, input length must be a multiple of 4; when decoding, input length must be a multiple of 5

--help

display this help and exit

--version

output version information and exit

When decoding, the input may contain newlines in addition to the bytes of the formal alphabet. Use --ignore-garbage to attempt to recover from any other non-alphabet bytes in the encoded stream.

Encoding examples

$ printf '\376\117\202' | basenc --base64
/k+C
$ printf '\376\117\202' | basenc --base64url
_k-C
$ printf '\376\117\202' | basenc --base32
7ZHYE===
$ printf '\376\117\202' | basenc --base32hex
VP7O4===
$ printf '\376\117\202' | basenc --base16
FE4F82
$ printf '\376\117\202' | basenc --base2lsbf
011111111111001001000001
$ printf '\376\117\202' | basenc --base2msbf
111111100100111110000010
$ printf '\376\117\202\000' | basenc --z85
@.FaC

Releases

4 releases since Debian 11 (Bullseye); the text changed 3 times.

  1. 11
  2. 12
  3. 13
  4. Arch

--base58 since Arch Linux 2026-11-01.

Author

Written by Simon Josefsson and Assaf Gordon.

Reporting bugs

Report bugs to: <[email protected]>.
Report any translation bugs to: <https://translationproject.org/team/>.
GNU coreutils home page: <https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/>
General help using GNU software: <https://www.gnu.org/gethelp/>

From coreutils 9.12-2 in Arch Linux 2026-11-01. Parsed by carta from the page's man source.