Quick Tip: How to Check Your curl Version

Quick Tip: How to Check Your curl Version
Photo by Alex Korolkoff / Unsplash

curl is a powerful command-line tool used to transfer data over various network protocols, such as HTTP, HTTPS, FTP, and more. Knowing your curl version can be helpful for troubleshooting, ensuring compatibility, or simply verifying that you're using the latest features.

Checking Your curl Version

To quickly find out which version of curl is installed on your system, use the following command in your terminal:

curl --version

What You’ll See

The output will provide several key details about your curl installation:

  • Version number: The exact version of curl installed on your system.
  • Supported protocols: A list of network protocols that your curl supports, such as HTTP, HTTPS, FTP, etc.
  • SSL version: Information about the SSL/TLS version, which shows whether secure protocols (like HTTPS) are supported.
  • Features: Lists optional features that are compiled into your curl build, such as IPv6, HTTP/2, or libz compression.

Example Output

curl 8.5.0 (x86_64-pc-linux-gnu) libcurl/8.5.0 OpenSSL/3.0.13 zlib/1.3 brotli/1.1.0 zstd/1.5.5 libidn2/2.3.7 libpsl/0.21.2 (+libidn2/2.3.7) libssh/0.10.6/openssl/zlib nghttp2/1.59.0 librtmp/2.3 OpenLDAP/2.6.7
Release-Date: 2023-12-06, security patched: 8.5.0-2ubuntu10.4
Protocols: dict file ftp ftps gopher gophers http https imap imaps ldap ldaps mqtt pop3 pop3s rtmp rtsp scp sftp smb smbs smtp smtps telnet tftp
Features: alt-svc AsynchDNS brotli GSS-API HSTS HTTP2 HTTPS-proxy IDN IPv6 Kerberos Largefile libz NTLM PSL SPNEGO SSL threadsafe TLS-SRP UnixSockets zstd

In this example:

  • The installed curl version is 8.5.0.
  • It supports various protocols like HTTP, HTTPS, FTP, and others.
  • The build includes the OpenSSL library for secure connections.

Why This Is Useful

Knowing the curl version helps:

  • Troubleshoot issues with specific features or protocols.
  • Verify security protocols for secure data transfers.
  • Check compatibility with APIs or services that may require a certain curl version.

Keep this command handy for when you need to check or upgrade your curl installation!

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