| TYPE(1) | fish-shell | TYPE(1) |
NAME
type - locate a command and describe its type
SYNOPSIS
type [OPTIONS] NAME [...]
DESCRIPTION
NOTE: This page documents the fish builtin type. To see the documentation on any non-fish versions, use command man type.
With no options, type indicates how each NAME would be interpreted if used as a command name.
The following options are available:
- -a or --all
- Prints all of possible definitions of the specified names.
- -s or --short
- Don't print function definitions when used with no options or with -a/--all.
- -f or --no-functions
- Suppresses function lookup.
- -t or --type
- Prints function, builtin, or file if NAME is a shell function, builtin, or disk file, respectively.
- -p or --path
- Prints the path to NAME if NAME resolves to an executable file in PATH <#envvar-PATH>, the path to the script containing the definition of the function NAME if NAME resolves to a function loaded from a file on disk (i.e. not interactively defined at the prompt), or nothing otherwise.
- -P or --force-path
- Returns the path to the executable file NAME, presuming NAME is found in the PATH <#envvar-PATH> environment variable, or nothing otherwise. --force-path explicitly resolves only the path to executable files in PATH <#envvar-PATH>, regardless of whether NAME is shadowed by a function or builtin with the same name.
- -q or --query
- Suppresses all output; this is useful when testing the exit status. For compatibility with old fish versions this is also --quiet.
- --color WHEN
- Controls when to use syntax highlighting colors when printing function definitions. WHEN can be auto (the default, colorize if the output is a terminal <>), always, or never.
- -h or --help
- Displays help about using this command.
The -q, -p, -t and -P flags (and their long flag aliases) are mutually exclusive. Only one can be specified at a time.
type returns 0 if at least one entry was found, 1 otherwise, and 2 for invalid options or option combinations.
EXAMPLE
>_ type fg fg is a builtin
Copyright
fish-shell developers
| October 10, 2026 | 4.9 |