I urgently need a visual way to find out which files and directories are taking up space on my Linux system. I used WizTree in the past, but I haven't found an equivalent that works the way I want. Running du commands manually is cumbersome and doesn't provide an easy-to-browse overview. I tried QDirStat from Flathub, but it dramatically underreports directories such as /var and /usr—showing only a few hundred megabytes even though they occupy around 20 GB—even when launched with administrator privileges. What tools should I try instead?
3 Answers
Filelight and GNOME Disk Usage Analyzer (Baobab) are both good graphical options for browsing directory sizes. They should give you a visual breakdown that’s much easier to navigate than running du manually.
If you’re okay with a terminal interface, dust or ncdu are worth trying. They provide a browsable directory layout, so you can move through folders interactively instead of typing a new command for every location.
You could also try Duc. It indexes the filesystem first, then lets you browse the results through several interfaces, including a graphical and web-based UI. The indexing step can be scheduled if you want regularly updated results.
I don’t mind a command-line interface as long as it’s interactive and easy to browse. I mainly want a clear layout instead of having to enter a separate command each time.