Find Recent Files With -newermt
Match files modified after an absolute date for cleanup or auditing.
Run find . -type f -newermt '2026-01-01' to list files changed since that date.
01Command
Command
$ find . -type f -newermt '2026-01-01' -name '*.log'02What it does
-newermt accepts an actual date instead of the awkward -mtime day counts, making time-based searches readable and precise. This is the building block for scheduled log rotation, stale-file reports and incremental processing, all driven from scripts.
03Risk
!Warning: Timestamp tests use file modification time and can be fooled by tools that rewrite metadata; combine with other predicates.
04Undo
✓No undo needed — this command does not change persistent state.
05Sources
- find.1.en.html manual page (Debian bookworm)Evidence: Documents -newermt and other time-based file tests.
Last verified: 2026-10-13 · Category: Files & Folders
06Related solutions
Find Recently Modified Files with find -mtime
find -mtime/-mmin locates files changed within a time window, and -exec acts on them in one pass.
Search text recursively in a directory with grep
Find every occurrence of a pattern across all files in a tree, printed as file:line:number matches.
Extract a .tar.gz archive with tar
Unpack a gzipped tarball into the current directory while printing each file as it is extracted.