How to Move or Rename Files in Linux (mv)

mv moves a file or directory to a new location, or renames it if the destination is in the same directory.

Key points

• There's no separate "rename" command in Linux — mv oldname.txt newname.txt renames a file
• Moving across different filesystems/drives may take noticeably longer than a rename on the same filesystem
• mv -i prompts before overwriting a file that already exists at the destination

Example

mv old-name.txt new-name.txt