TN3215: Reading man pages
Use the Terminal app to read the documentation for command-line tools and low-level APIs.
Overview
Apple’s man pages, short for manual pages, document command-line tools, low-level APIs, and file formats. If you’re working at the lowest levels of the system, don’t miss out on this rich source of information.
Display a man page in the Terminal app
Type man and the name of a tool or API whose documentation you want to access, and press Return. Because the man page is larger than the window, Terminal displays only the first part of the page. Press Space to display subsequent parts, or press Q to exit the man tool.
Search a specific section
Section 1 of the man pages covers command-line tools, section 2 covers system calls, section 3 covers user-space libraries, and so on. If you don’t specify a section, man displays the page from the first section that has a matching entry. For example, the following command displays the man page for the open command-line tool:
% man openTo get the man page for the open system call, specify section 2:
% man 2 openIf you’re not sure which section to use, do a keyword search using the -k option. For example, the following command shows all the man pages that mention open.
% man -k openLearn more about man pages
The man command-line tool has its own man page, which is a good place to learn more about this feature:
% man manRevision History
2026-10-08 First published.