What it does
MinIO is a fast S3-compatible object store you can run yourself (on VMs or Kubernetes) — useful for backups, Loki/Tempo storage, Terraform state in labs, and artifacts. mc works with aliases (a URL + keys) and has Unix-like commands: ls, cp, mirror, rm, cat, plus admin commands for users and policies. On some systems the binary is called mcli to avoid a clash with Midnight Commander.
How to write it
mc alias set NAME URL ACCESS_KEY SECRET_KEY
mc COMMAND ALIAS/BUCKET/PATHMain parts
Commands
aliasset|list|remove- Save server connections.
mb/rbALIAS/BUCKET- Make / remove a bucket.
ls/tree/du- List / tree / size.
cp/mv/rm- Copy / move / remove objects.
mirrorSRCDST- Sync folders or buckets (backups).
cat/head- Read an object.
sharedownloadPATH- Time-limited link.
versionenableALIAS/BUCKET- Turn on versioning.
ilmruleadd- Lifecycle (expire old objects).
encryptsetsse-s3ALIAS/BUCKET- Default encryption.
adminuser|policy|info- Users, policies, server info.
anonymoussetnoneALIAS/BUCKET- No public access.
Options 6
Most used
Flags
Nothing matches this filter.
Examples 10
$ run as a normal user# run as root (or with sudo)
1Run MinIO for a lab
podman run -d --name minio -p 127.0.0.1:9000:9000 -p 127.0.0.1:9001:9001 -e MINIO_ROOT_USER=admin -e MINIO_ROOT_PASSWORD=labonly-2026 quay.io/minio/minio server /data --console-address :90012Set an alias and make a bucket
mc alias set lab http://127.0.0.1:9000 admin labonly-2026 mc mb lab/backups mc ls lab3Copy and list files
mc cp backup-2026-10-27.tar.gz.age lab/backups/web1/ mc ls --recursive lab/backups/4Mirror a folder every night (backup)
mc mirror --overwrite /srv/backups lab/backups/web15Turn on versioning and default encryption
mc version enable lab/backups mc encrypt set sse-s3 lab/backups6Delete backups older than 30 days with a lifecycle rule
mc ilm rule add --expire-days 30 lab/backups7Make sure nothing is public
mc anonymous get lab/backups mc anonymous set none lab/backups8A user that can only write backups
cat backup-writer.json {"Version":"2012-10-17","Statement":[{"Effect":"Allow","Action":["s3:PutObject","s3:ListBucket"],"Resource":["arn:aws:s3:::backups","arn:aws:s3:::backups/*"]}]} mc admin policy create lab backup-writer backup-writer.json mc admin user add lab web1-backup 'Ch4nge-me-2026-long' mc admin policy attach lab backup-writer --user web1-backup9Share a file for one hour
mc share download --expire 1h lab/backups/web1/backup-2026-10-27.tar.gz.age10Use mc with AWS S3
mc alias set s3 https://s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com AKIAEXAMPLEONLY0000 exampleSecretOnly mc ls s3/s0sta-lab-backups-2026
Nothing matches this filter.
Watch out
- Aliases store keys in
~/.mc/config.json— keep it private. mirror --removedeletes objects in the target that are not in the source.- Backup users should not have delete rights (protects against ransomware); use versioning or object lock.
Files
~/.mc/config.json- Aliases and keys.
Tips to remember
- Use object lock (WORM) for backups that even an admin cannot delete for N days.
Exit codes
0 | Success. |
1 | Error. |