Delete a file with C#

This post will discuss how to delete a file using C#.

In C#, we can use the File.Delete() method for deleting a given file. It takes a single argument – relative or absolute path of the file to be deleted without any wildcard characters.

This method throws a DirectoryNotFoundException if the specified path is invalid and an IOException when the specified file is in use. It doesn’t throw an exception when a file deletion fails.

The following example first checks if a specified file exists using File.Exists. The File.Delete() method is called then if the file is present.

using System;

using System.IO;

public class Example

{

public static void Main()

{

string fileName = @"C:\some\path\somefile.txt";

if (File.Exists(fileName))

{

try {

File.Delete(fileName);

}

catch (Exception e) {

Console.WriteLine("The deletion failed: {0}", e.Message);

}

else {

Console.WriteLine("Specified file doesn't exist");

}

Output: ABC

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Since the File.Delete() method doesn’t throw an exception if the file doesn’t exist, there is no need to check for the file’s existence. We can simplify the code as follows:

using System;

using System.IO;

public class Example

{

public static void Main()

{

string fileName = @"C:\some\path\somefile.txt";

try {

File.Delete(fileName);

}

catch (Exception e) {

Console.WriteLine("The deletion failed: {0}", e.Message);

}

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We can also use an instance of the FileInfo class to delete a file in C#. Its Delete() method works similarly to the File.Delete() method discussed above.

using System;

using System.IO;

public class Example

{

public static void Main()

{

string fileName = @"C:\some\path\somefile.txt";

try {

FileInfo file = new FileInfo(fileName);

file.Delete();

}

catch (Exception e) {

Console.WriteLine("The deletion failed: {0}", e.Message);

}

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To delete the directory and all its subdirectories, the Directory.Delete() method can be used, as demonstrated below:

using System;

using System.IO;

public class Example

{

public static void Main()

{

string path = @"C:\some\path";

try {

Directory.Delete(path);

}

catch (Exception e) {

Console.WriteLine("The deletion failed: {0}", e.Message);

}

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That’s all about deleting a file with C#.

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