Time the execution time of multiple commands

Question

Is there a way to time a series of commands in linux?

Perhaps something like this:

/usr/bin/time { ls; pwd; ls }

even without the time command this would fail as it needs the final ; i.e. { ls ; pwd ; ls ; } — northern-bradley, Nov 3, 2018 at 19:07

faffaffaff · Accepted Answer · 2013-06-17 12:20:39Z

13

You could try to wrap it in a shell command:

/usr/bin/time /bin/sh -c 'ls;pwd;ls'

answered Jun 17, 2013 at 12:20

faffaffaff

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suspectus · Accepted Answer · 2013-06-17 12:42:01Z

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Using time use () to create a subshell for the commands you wish to time. The syntax would be:

time ( ls; pwd; ls )

If using /usr/bin/time then add the commands to a shell script (for example my.sh) and time the shell script-:

/usr/bin/time my.sh

answered Jun 17, 2013 at 12:26

suspectus

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This works with time but not with /usr/bin/time. Running the command you gave produces -bash: syntax error near unexpected token ls'`
– juniper-
Jun 17, 2013 at 12:32
Although the accepted answer at unix.stackexchange.com/a/46106/419658 works great, I still prefer this version because it makes the code much readable, instead of just being passed as a string to sh -c. Anyway, Can somebody please point a situation when one would be preferred over another?
– BhaveshDiwan
Aug 13, 2020 at 1:17
I can see that this works on bash and zsh, but not on sh and fish. I guess this may answer your question as to whether we should prefer one or the other: portability.
– BenMorel
May 19, 2021 at 13:40

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