How to compare two files with Command Prompt on Windows 10 (2024)

FAQs

How to compare two files with Command Prompt on Windows 10? ›

Open Start. Search for Command Prompt, right-click the top result, and select the Run as administrator option. Type the following command to compare two similar files and press Enter: fc

To compare files in Windows 10, launch File Explorer and select the two folders you wish to compare. Then, right-click on the folder, select “Compare” from the context menu. A window will appear showing the differences between the contents of the two folders.

Use the diff checker to compare code files for debugging or compare creative text files to ensure you avoid plagiarism or duplicate content. A text diff tool automatically highlights any detected text difference, making fixing any errors in your text documents much easier.

One way to compare folders is to right-click your folders one at a time and choose "Properties" for each. Then compare the Properties window of each folder. The robocopy command is a command-line tool that can be used to view the differences between folder.

Which command is used to display the differences between files? Explanation: diff command is used for comparing files and displaying the differences between them.

The Linux diff command compares two files line by line and displays the differences. This command-line utility lists changes you must apply to make the files identical.

If you enter the COMP command with no options , the program will prompt you for the file and/or path designations. After you enter the second filename(s), the program will compare the files, issuing reports on its progress. If the files are not identical, it will report on the differences it finds.

It works in Windows 10 but you might find problems from time to time. Whichever source you get it from, it is a very old tool that is no longer developed or supported.

How do I compare two file systems in Windows? ›

To compare two files or groups of files at a local site, you can use the Fc.exe and the Comp.exe file compare commands. Both commands are run from a command prompt. You can use Fc.exe to compare two ASCII or binary files on a line-by-line basis. It offers several command-line options.

WinMerge can compare both folders and files, presenting differences in a visual text format that is easy to understand and handle.

Compare two files (command-line)

From the Developer Command Prompt, use the /Diff ( -diff ) option.

Hash comparison is a popular and fast method to check if two files have same content. A hash function takes a file and generates a fixed-size string, known as a hash value, that represents content of file. If two files have same hash value, it is almost certain that they have same content.

When 'cmp' is used for comparison between two files, it reports the location of the first mismatch to the screen if a difference is found and if no difference is found i.e. the files compared are identical. 'cmp' displays no message and simply returns the prompt if the files compared are identical.

If you only want to view the lines that are different, you can use Plugins > ComparePlus > Show Only Diffs (or the ShowOnlyDiffs button next to the “Last” button on the toolbar), but unfortunately, even if it only shows the differing lines, it will still copy all the lines (even the hidden ones) with a Ctrl+A, Ctrl+C .