How to skip "are you sure Y/N" when deleting files in batch files

Question

I can't for the life of me remember how to bypass the annoying prompt are you sure? Y/N when deleting files.

I seem to recall it was something like:

del C:\Test && ECHO Y

There is some confusion in this question, because you say that you want to delete files, but the above line does not prompt for confirmation if C:\Test is a file. It prompts only if C:\Test is a *directory*. — Raymond Chen, Aug 23 '11 at 13:55

Kerrek SB · Accepted Answer · 2018-09-12T20:06:54.360

263

Use del /F /Q to force deletion of read-only files (/F) and directories and not ask to confirm (/Q) when deleting via wildcard.

edited Sep 12 '18 at 20:06

answered Aug 23 '11 at 11:34

Kerrek SB

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score 77 · Answer 2 · edited Jun 28 '18 at 06:29

77

Add /Q for quiet mode and it should remove the prompt.

edited Jun 28 '18 at 06:29

Uwe Keim

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answered Aug 23 '11 at 11:35

Nicholas Smith

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score 5 · Answer 3 · edited Jun 28 '18 at 06:30

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I just want to add that this nearly identical post provides the very useful alternative of using an echo pipe if no force or quiet switch is available. For instance, I think it's the only way to bypass the Y/N prompt in this example.

Echo y|NETDOM COMPUTERNAME WorkComp /Add:Work-Comp

In a general sense you should first look at your command switches for /f, /q, or some variant thereof (for example, Netdom RenameComputer uses /Force, not /f). If there is no switch available, then use an echo pipe.

edited Jun 28 '18 at 06:30

Uwe Keim

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answered Aug 11 '15 at 19:47

u8it

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Disadvantage: this will not work in for example German Windows editions because they expect `J` to confirm – Marged Sep 12 '18 at 20:14

score 3 · Answer 4 · answered Jan 25 '22 at 06:32

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If you are using powershell, for example from vscode terminal, you can use -Recurse -Force instead:

del C:\Test -Recurse -Force

Note: I know that the question have cmd tag, but someone might come here for powershell or vscode.

answered Jan 25 '22 at 06:32

Muhammad Yasirroni

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score -1 · Answer 5 · edited Sep 14 '17 at 04:17

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You have the following options on Windows command line:

net use [DeviceName [/home[{Password | *}] [/delete:{yes | no}]]

Try like:

net use H: /delete /y

edited Sep 14 '17 at 04:17

Pang

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answered Sep 14 '17 at 03:56

slon

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I'm missing the relevance to deleting files? – jeb Feb 10 '20 at 14:53

How to skip "are you sure Y/N" when deleting files in batch files

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