curl

Send an HTTP request from the terminal

What it does

curl sends a request to an address and prints the response. On a server this is how you check that a site or API answers: curl http://localhost:3000/health. -I asks for the headers only, so you see the status code, redirects and caching.

-L follows redirects, -o <file> saves the response to a file, and -X POST with -d sends data. -v shows the whole exchange with the server, TLS included, which helps when something does not work.

Syntax

curl <url>
curl -I <url>
curl -L -o <file> <url>

Examples

• Ask https://example.com for the response headers only

  curl -I https://example.com

  same as: curl --head https://example.com

  • curl — an HTTP request from the terminal
  • -I — headers only: status, redirects, caching
  • https://example.com — the address

Related commands

• ping — Check whether a host is reachable
• ss — Find out which ports are open and who listens on them
• systemctl — Manage services: start, stop, start at boot

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