How to Disable Unrar Archive Comments

When extracting RAR archives using the command-line utility unrar, embedded archive comments often print automatically to the terminal, cluttering the output. This guide demonstrates how to suppress these comments using the dedicated -c- command-line switch and outlines alternative silent flags suited for automated scripts and headless environments.

The -c- Switch

The standard method to prevent unrar from displaying archive comments is the -c- switch. In the RAR command syntax, appending a minus sign (-) to specific options disables that behavior. By default, comment display is active (-c+), so using -c- explicitly instructs the utility to skip printing comment blocks to stdout.

Basic Usage

To extract an archive with full directory paths while hiding comments, run:

unrar x -c- archive.rar

To extract files into the current working directory without directory paths:

unrar e -c- archive.rar

To list the contents of an archive without printing comments:

unrar l -c- archive.rar

Suppressing All Terminal Output with -inul

If you are running unrar within a shell script or cron job and want to suppress all standard output, including comments, file names, and progress indicators, use the -inul (input/output null) switch:

unrar x -inul archive.rar

When -inul is supplied, unrar will produce no standard terminal output. If an error occurs, you can still check the shell exit status code ($?) to determine whether the operation was successful.

Selective Suppression with -id

Modern versions of unrar also provide the -id switch, which allows you to selectively disable message types:

• -idc: Disables the copyright banner.
• -idp: Disables the percentage progress indicator.
• -idq: Turns on quiet mode, displaying only error messages.

You can combine these with the -c- flag to achieve clean, readable logs:

unrar x -idc -c- archive.rar