8 5. Detailed list of parameters
13 1.0 Overview and history
14 ------------------------
15 fio was originally written to save me the hassle of writing special test
16 case programs when I wanted to test a specific workload, either for
17 performance reasons or to find/reproduce a bug. The process of writing
18 such a test app can be tiresome, especially if you have to do it often.
19 Hence I needed a tool that would be able to simulate a given io workload
20 without resorting to writing a tailored test case again and again.
22 A test work load is difficult to define, though. There can be any number
23 of processes or threads involved, and they can each be using their own
24 way of generating io. You could have someone dirtying large amounts of
25 memory in an memory mapped file, or maybe several threads issuing
26 reads using asynchronous io. fio needed to be flexible enough to
27 simulate both of these cases, and many more.
31 The first step in getting fio to simulate a desired io workload, is
32 writing a job file describing that specific setup. A job file may contain
33 any number of threads and/or files - the typical contents of the job file
34 is a global section defining shared parameters, and one or more job
35 sections describing the jobs involved. When run, fio parses this file
36 and sets everything up as described. If we break down a job from top to
37 bottom, it contains the following basic parameters:
39 IO type Defines the io pattern issued to the file(s).
40 We may only be reading sequentially from this
41 file(s), or we may be writing randomly. Or even
42 mixing reads and writes, sequentially or randomly.
44 Block size In how large chunks are we issuing io? This may be
45 a single value, or it may describe a range of
48 IO size How much data are we going to be reading/writing.
50 IO engine How do we issue io? We could be memory mapping the
51 file, we could be using regular read/write, we
52 could be using splice, async io, syslet, or even
55 IO depth If the io engine is async, how large a queuing
56 depth do we want to maintain?
58 IO type Should we be doing buffered io, or direct/raw io?
60 Num files How many files are we spreading the workload over.
62 Num threads How many threads or processes should we spread
65 The above are the basic parameters defined for a workload, in addition
66 there's a multitude of parameters that modify other aspects of how this
72 See the README file for command line parameters, there are only a few
75 Running fio is normally the easiest part - you just give it the job file
76 (or job files) as parameters:
80 and it will start doing what the job_file tells it to do. You can give
81 more than one job file on the command line, fio will serialize the running
82 of those files. Internally that is the same as using the 'stonewall'
83 parameter described the the parameter section.
85 If the job file contains only one job, you may as well just give the
86 parameters on the command line. The command line parameters are identical
87 to the job parameters, with a few extra that control global parameters
88 (see README). For example, for the job file parameter iodepth=2, the
89 mirror command line option would be --iodepth 2 or --iodepth=2. You can
90 also use the command line for giving more than one job entry. For each
91 --name option that fio sees, it will start a new job with that name.
92 Command line entries following a --name entry will apply to that job,
93 until there are no more entries or a new --name entry is seen. This is
94 similar to the job file options, where each option applies to the current
95 job until a new [] job entry is seen.
97 fio does not need to run as root, except if the files or devices specified
98 in the job section requires that. Some other options may also be restricted,
99 such as memory locking, io scheduler switching, and decreasing the nice value.
104 As previously described, fio accepts one or more job files describing
105 what it is supposed to do. The job file format is the classic ini file,
106 where the names enclosed in [] brackets define the job name. You are free
107 to use any ascii name you want, except 'global' which has special meaning.
108 A global section sets defaults for the jobs described in that file. A job
109 may override a global section parameter, and a job file may even have
110 several global sections if so desired. A job is only affected by a global
111 section residing above it. If the first character in a line is a ';' or a
112 '#', the entire line is discarded as a comment.
114 So let's look at a really simple job file that defines two processes, each
115 randomly reading from a 128MB file.
117 ; -- start job file --
128 As you can see, the job file sections themselves are empty as all the
129 described parameters are shared. As no filename= option is given, fio
130 makes up a filename for each of the jobs as it sees fit. On the command
131 line, this job would look as follows:
133 $ fio --name=global --rw=randread --size=128m --name=job1 --name=job2
136 Let's look at an example that has a number of processes writing randomly
139 ; -- start job file --
151 Here we have no global section, as we only have one job defined anyway.
152 We want to use async io here, with a depth of 4 for each file. We also
153 increased the buffer size used to 32KB and define numjobs to 4 to
154 fork 4 identical jobs. The result is 4 processes each randomly writing
155 to their own 64MB file. Instead of using the above job file, you could
156 have given the parameters on the command line. For this case, you would
159 $ fio --name=random-writers --ioengine=libaio --iodepth=4 --rw=randwrite --bs=32k --direct=0 --size=64m --numjobs=4
161 4.1 Environment variables
162 -------------------------
164 fio also supports environment variable expansion in job files. Any
165 substring of the form "${VARNAME}" as part of an option value (in other
166 words, on the right of the `='), will be expanded to the value of the
167 environment variable called VARNAME. If no such environment variable
168 is defined, or VARNAME is the empty string, the empty string will be
171 As an example, let's look at a sample fio invocation and job file:
173 $ SIZE=64m NUMJOBS=4 fio jobfile.fio
175 ; -- start job file --
182 This will expand to the following equivalent job file at runtime:
184 ; -- start job file --
191 fio ships with a few example job files, you can also look there for
194 4.2 Reserved keywords
195 ---------------------
197 Additionally, fio has a set of reserved keywords that will be replaced
198 internally with the appropriate value. Those keywords are:
200 $pagesize The architecture page size of the running system
201 $mb_memory Megabytes of total memory in the system
202 $ncpus Number of online available CPUs
204 These can be used on the command line or in the job file, and will be
205 automatically substituted with the current system values when the job
206 is run. Simple math is also supported on these keywords, so you can
207 perform actions like:
211 and get that properly expanded to 8 times the size of memory in the
215 5.0 Detailed list of parameters
216 -------------------------------
218 This section describes in details each parameter associated with a job.
219 Some parameters take an option of a given type, such as an integer or
220 a string. The following types are used:
222 str String. This is a sequence of alpha characters.
223 time Integer with possible time suffix. In seconds unless otherwise
224 specified, use eg 10m for 10 minutes. Accepts s/m/h for seconds,
226 int SI integer. A whole number value, which may contain a suffix
227 describing the base of the number. Accepted suffixes are k/m/g/t/p,
228 meaning kilo, mega, giga, tera, and peta. The suffix is not case
229 sensitive, and you may also include trailing 'b' (eg 'kb' is the same
230 as 'k'). So if you want to specify 4096, you could either write
231 out '4096' or just give 4k. The suffixes signify base 2 values, so
232 1024 is 1k and 1024k is 1m and so on, unless the suffix is explicitly
233 set to a base 10 value using 'kib', 'mib', 'gib', etc. If that is the
234 case, then 1000 is used as the multiplier. This can be handy for
235 disks, since manufacturers generally use base 10 values when listing
236 the capacity of a drive. If the option accepts an upper and lower
237 range, use a colon ':' or minus '-' to separate such values. May also
238 include a prefix to indicate numbers base. If 0x is used, the number
239 is assumed to be hexadecimal. See irange.
240 bool Boolean. Usually parsed as an integer, however only defined for
241 true and false (1 and 0).
242 irange Integer range with suffix. Allows value range to be given, such
243 as 1024-4096. A colon may also be used as the separator, eg
244 1k:4k. If the option allows two sets of ranges, they can be
245 specified with a ',' or '/' delimiter: 1k-4k/8k-32k. Also see
248 With the above in mind, here follows the complete list of fio job
251 name=str ASCII name of the job. This may be used to override the
252 name printed by fio for this job. Otherwise the job
253 name is used. On the command line this parameter has the
254 special purpose of also signaling the start of a new
257 description=str Text description of the job. Doesn't do anything except
258 dump this text description when this job is run. It's
261 directory=str Prefix filenames with this directory. Used to place files
262 in a different location than "./".
264 filename=str Fio normally makes up a filename based on the job name,
265 thread number, and file number. If you want to share
266 files between threads in a job or several jobs, specify
267 a filename for each of them to override the default. If
268 the ioengine used is 'net', the filename is the host, port,
269 and protocol to use in the format of =host/port/protocol.
270 See ioengine=net for more. If the ioengine is file based, you
271 can specify a number of files by separating the names with a
272 ':' colon. So if you wanted a job to open /dev/sda and /dev/sdb
273 as the two working files, you would use
274 filename=/dev/sda:/dev/sdb. On Windows, disk devices are accessed
275 as \\.\PhysicalDrive0 for the first device, \\.\PhysicalDrive1
276 for the second etc. If the wanted filename does need to
277 include a colon, then escape that with a '\' character.
278 For instance, if the filename is "/dev/dsk/foo@3,0:c",
279 then you would use filename="/dev/dsk/foo@3,0\:c".
280 '-' is a reserved name, meaning stdin or stdout. Which of the
281 two depends on the read/write direction set.
283 opendir=str Tell fio to recursively add any file it can find in this
284 directory and down the file system tree.
286 lockfile=str Fio defaults to not locking any files before it does
287 IO to them. If a file or file descriptor is shared, fio
288 can serialize IO to that file to make the end result
289 consistent. This is usual for emulating real workloads that
290 share files. The lock modes are:
292 none No locking. The default.
293 exclusive Only one thread/process may do IO,
294 excluding all others.
295 readwrite Read-write locking on the file. Many
296 readers may access the file at the
297 same time, but writes get exclusive
300 The option may be post-fixed with a lock batch number. If
301 set, then each thread/process may do that amount of IOs to
302 the file before giving up the lock. Since lock acquisition is
303 expensive, batching the lock/unlocks will speed up IO.
306 rw=str Type of io pattern. Accepted values are:
308 read Sequential reads
309 write Sequential writes
310 randwrite Random writes
311 randread Random reads
312 rw Sequential mixed reads and writes
313 randrw Random mixed reads and writes
315 For the mixed io types, the default is to split them 50/50.
316 For certain types of io the result may still be skewed a bit,
317 since the speed may be different. It is possible to specify
318 a number of IO's to do before getting a new offset, this is
319 one by appending a ':<nr>' to the end of the string given.
320 For a random read, it would look like 'rw=randread:8' for
321 passing in an offset modifier with a value of 8. See the
322 'rw_sequencer' option.
324 rw_sequencer=str If an offset modifier is given by appending a number to
325 the rw=<str> line, then this option controls how that
326 number modifies the IO offset being generated. Accepted
329 sequential Generate sequential offset
330 identical Generate the same offset
332 'sequential' is only useful for random IO, where fio would
333 normally generate a new random offset for every IO. If you
334 append eg 8 to randread, you would get a new random offset for
335 every 8 IO's. The result would be a seek for only every 8
336 IO's, instead of for every IO. Use rw=randread:8 to specify
337 that. As sequential IO is already sequential, setting
338 'sequential' for that would not result in any differences.
339 'identical' behaves in a similar fashion, except it sends
340 the same offset 8 number of times before generating a new
343 kb_base=int The base unit for a kilobyte. The defacto base is 2^10, 1024.
344 Storage manufacturers like to use 10^3 or 1000 as a base
345 ten unit instead, for obvious reasons. Allow values are
346 1024 or 1000, with 1024 being the default.
348 randrepeat=bool For random IO workloads, seed the generator in a predictable
349 way so that results are repeatable across repetitions.
351 fallocate=bool By default, fio will use fallocate() to advise the system
352 of the size of the file we are going to write. This can be
353 turned off with fallocate=0. May not be available on all
354 supported platforms. If using ZFS on Solaris this must be
355 set to 0 because ZFS doesn't support it.
357 fadvise_hint=bool By default, fio will use fadvise() to advise the kernel
358 on what IO patterns it is likely to issue. Sometimes you
359 want to test specific IO patterns without telling the
360 kernel about it, in which case you can disable this option.
361 If set, fio will use POSIX_FADV_SEQUENTIAL for sequential
362 IO and POSIX_FADV_RANDOM for random IO.
364 size=int The total size of file io for this job. Fio will run until
365 this many bytes has been transferred, unless runtime is
366 limited by other options (such as 'runtime', for instance).
367 Unless specific nrfiles and filesize options are given,
368 fio will divide this size between the available files
369 specified by the job. If not set, fio will use the full
370 size of the given files or devices. If the the files
371 do not exist, size must be given.
373 filesize=int Individual file sizes. May be a range, in which case fio
374 will select sizes for files at random within the given range
375 and limited to 'size' in total (if that is given). If not
376 given, each created file is the same size.
378 fill_device=bool Sets size to something really large and waits for ENOSPC (no
379 space left on device) as the terminating condition. Only makes
380 sense with sequential write. For a read workload, the mount
381 point will be filled first then IO started on the result.
384 bs=int The block size used for the io units. Defaults to 4k. Values
385 can be given for both read and writes. If a single int is
386 given, it will apply to both. If a second int is specified
387 after a comma, it will apply to writes only. In other words,
388 the format is either bs=read_and_write or bs=read,write.
389 bs=4k,8k will thus use 4k blocks for reads, and 8k blocks
390 for writes. If you only wish to set the write size, you
391 can do so by passing an empty read size - bs=,8k will set
392 8k for writes and leave the read default value.
395 ba=int At what boundary to align random IO offsets. Defaults to
396 the same as 'blocksize' the minimum blocksize given.
397 Minimum alignment is typically 512b for using direct IO,
398 though it usually depends on the hardware block size. This
399 option is mutually exclusive with using a random map for
400 files, so it will turn off that option.
402 blocksize_range=irange
403 bsrange=irange Instead of giving a single block size, specify a range
404 and fio will mix the issued io block sizes. The issued
405 io unit will always be a multiple of the minimum value
406 given (also see bs_unaligned). Applies to both reads and
407 writes, however a second range can be given after a comma.
410 bssplit=str Sometimes you want even finer grained control of the
411 block sizes issued, not just an even split between them.
412 This option allows you to weight various block sizes,
413 so that you are able to define a specific amount of
414 block sizes issued. The format for this option is:
416 bssplit=blocksize/percentage:blocksize/percentage
418 for as many block sizes as needed. So if you want to define
419 a workload that has 50% 64k blocks, 10% 4k blocks, and
420 40% 32k blocks, you would write:
422 bssplit=4k/10:64k/50:32k/40
424 Ordering does not matter. If the percentage is left blank,
425 fio will fill in the remaining values evenly. So a bssplit
426 option like this one:
428 bssplit=4k/50:1k/:32k/
430 would have 50% 4k ios, and 25% 1k and 32k ios. The percentages
431 always add up to 100, if bssplit is given a range that adds
432 up to more, it will error out.
434 bssplit also supports giving separate splits to reads and
435 writes. The format is identical to what bs= accepts. You
436 have to separate the read and write parts with a comma. So
437 if you want a workload that has 50% 2k reads and 50% 4k reads,
438 while having 90% 4k writes and 10% 8k writes, you would
441 bssplit=2k/50:4k/50,4k/90,8k/10
444 bs_unaligned If this option is given, any byte size value within bsrange
445 may be used as a block range. This typically wont work with
446 direct IO, as that normally requires sector alignment.
448 zero_buffers If this option is given, fio will init the IO buffers to
449 all zeroes. The default is to fill them with random data.
451 refill_buffers If this option is given, fio will refill the IO buffers
452 on every submit. The default is to only fill it at init
453 time and reuse that data. Only makes sense if zero_buffers
454 isn't specified, naturally. If data verification is enabled,
455 refill_buffers is also automatically enabled.
457 nrfiles=int Number of files to use for this job. Defaults to 1.
459 openfiles=int Number of files to keep open at the same time. Defaults to
460 the same as nrfiles, can be set smaller to limit the number
463 file_service_type=str Defines how fio decides which file from a job to
464 service next. The following types are defined:
466 random Just choose a file at random.
468 roundrobin Round robin over open files. This
471 sequential Finish one file before moving on to
472 the next. Multiple files can still be
473 open depending on 'openfiles'.
475 The string can have a number appended, indicating how
476 often to switch to a new file. So if option random:4 is
477 given, fio will switch to a new random file after 4 ios
480 ioengine=str Defines how the job issues io to the file. The following
483 sync Basic read(2) or write(2) io. lseek(2) is
484 used to position the io location.
486 psync Basic pread(2) or pwrite(2) io.
488 vsync Basic readv(2) or writev(2) IO.
490 libaio Linux native asynchronous io. Note that Linux
491 may only support queued behaviour with
492 non-buffered IO (set direct=1 or buffered=0).
494 posixaio glibc posix asynchronous io.
496 solarisaio Solaris native asynchronous io.
498 windowsaio Windows native asynchronous io.
500 mmap File is memory mapped and data copied
501 to/from using memcpy(3).
503 splice splice(2) is used to transfer the data and
504 vmsplice(2) to transfer data from user
507 syslet-rw Use the syslet system calls to make
508 regular read/write async.
510 sg SCSI generic sg v3 io. May either be
511 synchronous using the SG_IO ioctl, or if
512 the target is an sg character device
513 we use read(2) and write(2) for asynchronous
516 null Doesn't transfer any data, just pretends
517 to. This is mainly used to exercise fio
518 itself and for debugging/testing purposes.
520 net Transfer over the network to given host:port.
521 'filename' must be set appropriately to
522 filename=host/port/protocol regardless of send
523 or receive, if the latter only the port
524 argument is used. 'host' may be an IP address
525 or hostname, port is the port number to be used,
526 and protocol may be 'udp' or 'tcp'. If no
527 protocol is given, TCP is used.
529 netsplice Like net, but uses splice/vmsplice to
530 map data and send/receive.
532 cpuio Doesn't transfer any data, but burns CPU
533 cycles according to the cpuload= and
534 cpucycle= options. Setting cpuload=85
535 will cause that job to do nothing but burn
536 85% of the CPU. In case of SMP machines,
537 use numjobs=<no_of_cpu> to get desired CPU
538 usage, as the cpuload only loads a single
539 CPU at the desired rate.
541 guasi The GUASI IO engine is the Generic Userspace
542 Asyncronous Syscall Interface approach
545 http://www.xmailserver.org/guasi-lib.html
547 for more info on GUASI.
549 external Prefix to specify loading an external
550 IO engine object file. Append the engine
551 filename, eg ioengine=external:/tmp/foo.o
552 to load ioengine foo.o in /tmp.
554 iodepth=int This defines how many io units to keep in flight against
555 the file. The default is 1 for each file defined in this
556 job, can be overridden with a larger value for higher
557 concurrency. Note that increasing iodepth beyond 1 will not
558 affect synchronous ioengines (except for small degress when
559 verify_async is in use). Even async engines may impose OS
560 restrictions causing the desired depth not to be achieved.
561 This may happen on Linux when using libaio and not setting
562 direct=1, since buffered IO is not async on that OS. Keep an
563 eye on the IO depth distribution in the fio output to verify
564 that the achieved depth is as expected. Default: 1.
566 iodepth_batch_submit=int
567 iodepth_batch=int This defines how many pieces of IO to submit at once.
568 It defaults to 1 which means that we submit each IO
569 as soon as it is available, but can be raised to submit
570 bigger batches of IO at the time.
572 iodepth_batch_complete=int This defines how many pieces of IO to retrieve
573 at once. It defaults to 1 which means that we'll ask
574 for a minimum of 1 IO in the retrieval process from
575 the kernel. The IO retrieval will go on until we
576 hit the limit set by iodepth_low. If this variable is
577 set to 0, then fio will always check for completed
578 events before queuing more IO. This helps reduce
579 IO latency, at the cost of more retrieval system calls.
581 iodepth_low=int The low water mark indicating when to start filling
582 the queue again. Defaults to the same as iodepth, meaning
583 that fio will attempt to keep the queue full at all times.
584 If iodepth is set to eg 16 and iodepth_low is set to 4, then
585 after fio has filled the queue of 16 requests, it will let
586 the depth drain down to 4 before starting to fill it again.
588 direct=bool If value is true, use non-buffered io. This is usually
589 O_DIRECT. Note that ZFS on Solaris doesn't support direct io.
591 buffered=bool If value is true, use buffered io. This is the opposite
592 of the 'direct' option. Defaults to true.
594 offset=int Start io at the given offset in the file. The data before
595 the given offset will not be touched. This effectively
596 caps the file size at real_size - offset.
598 fsync=int If writing to a file, issue a sync of the dirty data
599 for every number of blocks given. For example, if you give
600 32 as a parameter, fio will sync the file for every 32
601 writes issued. If fio is using non-buffered io, we may
602 not sync the file. The exception is the sg io engine, which
603 synchronizes the disk cache anyway.
605 fdatasync=int Like fsync= but uses fdatasync() to only sync data and not
607 In FreeBSD there is no fdatasync(), this falls back to
610 sync_file_range=str:val Use sync_file_range() for every 'val' number of
611 write operations. Fio will track range of writes that
612 have happened since the last sync_file_range() call. 'str'
613 can currently be one or more of:
615 wait_before SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WAIT_BEFORE
616 write SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WRITE
617 wait_after SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WAIT_AFTER
619 So if you do sync_file_range=wait_before,write:8, fio would
620 use SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WAIT_BEFORE | SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WRITE for
621 every 8 writes. Also see the sync_file_range(2) man page.
622 This option is Linux specific.
624 overwrite=bool If true, writes to a file will always overwrite existing
625 data. If the file doesn't already exist, it will be
626 created before the write phase begins. If the file exists
627 and is large enough for the specified write phase, nothing
630 end_fsync=bool If true, fsync file contents when the job exits.
632 fsync_on_close=bool If true, fio will fsync() a dirty file on close.
633 This differs from end_fsync in that it will happen on every
634 file close, not just at the end of the job.
636 rwmixread=int How large a percentage of the mix should be reads.
638 rwmixwrite=int How large a percentage of the mix should be writes. If both
639 rwmixread and rwmixwrite is given and the values do not add
640 up to 100%, the latter of the two will be used to override
641 the first. This may interfere with a given rate setting,
642 if fio is asked to limit reads or writes to a certain rate.
643 If that is the case, then the distribution may be skewed.
645 norandommap Normally fio will cover every block of the file when doing
646 random IO. If this option is given, fio will just get a
647 new random offset without looking at past io history. This
648 means that some blocks may not be read or written, and that
649 some blocks may be read/written more than once. This option
650 is mutually exclusive with verify= if and only if multiple
651 blocksizes (via bsrange=) are used, since fio only tracks
652 complete rewrites of blocks.
654 softrandommap See norandommap. If fio runs with the random block map enabled
655 and it fails to allocate the map, if this option is set it
656 will continue without a random block map. As coverage will
657 not be as complete as with random maps, this option is
660 nice=int Run the job with the given nice value. See man nice(2).
662 prio=int Set the io priority value of this job. Linux limits us to
663 a positive value between 0 and 7, with 0 being the highest.
666 prioclass=int Set the io priority class. See man ionice(1).
668 thinktime=int Stall the job x microseconds after an io has completed before
669 issuing the next. May be used to simulate processing being
670 done by an application. See thinktime_blocks and
674 Only valid if thinktime is set - pretend to spend CPU time
675 doing something with the data received, before falling back
676 to sleeping for the rest of the period specified by
680 Only valid if thinktime is set - control how many blocks
681 to issue, before waiting 'thinktime' usecs. If not set,
682 defaults to 1 which will make fio wait 'thinktime' usecs
685 rate=int Cap the bandwidth used by this job. The number is in bytes/sec,
686 the normal suffix rules apply. You can use rate=500k to limit
687 reads and writes to 500k each, or you can specify read and
688 writes separately. Using rate=1m,500k would limit reads to
689 1MB/sec and writes to 500KB/sec. Capping only reads or
690 writes can be done with rate=,500k or rate=500k,. The former
691 will only limit writes (to 500KB/sec), the latter will only
694 ratemin=int Tell fio to do whatever it can to maintain at least this
695 bandwidth. Failing to meet this requirement, will cause
696 the job to exit. The same format as rate is used for
697 read vs write separation.
699 rate_iops=int Cap the bandwidth to this number of IOPS. Basically the same
700 as rate, just specified independently of bandwidth. If the
701 job is given a block size range instead of a fixed value,
702 the smallest block size is used as the metric. The same format
703 as rate is used for read vs write seperation.
705 rate_iops_min=int If fio doesn't meet this rate of IO, it will cause
706 the job to exit. The same format as rate is used for read vs
709 ratecycle=int Average bandwidth for 'rate' and 'ratemin' over this number
712 cpumask=int Set the CPU affinity of this job. The parameter given is a
713 bitmask of allowed CPU's the job may run on. So if you want
714 the allowed CPUs to be 1 and 5, you would pass the decimal
715 value of (1 << 1 | 1 << 5), or 34. See man
716 sched_setaffinity(2). This may not work on all supported
717 operating systems or kernel versions. This option doesn't
718 work well for a higher CPU count than what you can store in
719 an integer mask, so it can only control cpus 1-32. For
720 boxes with larger CPU counts, use cpus_allowed.
722 cpus_allowed=str Controls the same options as cpumask, but it allows a text
723 setting of the permitted CPUs instead. So to use CPUs 1 and
724 5, you would specify cpus_allowed=1,5. This options also
725 allows a range of CPUs. Say you wanted a binding to CPUs
726 1, 5, and 8-15, you would set cpus_allowed=1,5,8-15.
728 startdelay=time Start this job the specified number of seconds after fio
729 has started. Only useful if the job file contains several
730 jobs, and you want to delay starting some jobs to a certain
733 runtime=time Tell fio to terminate processing after the specified number
734 of seconds. It can be quite hard to determine for how long
735 a specified job will run, so this parameter is handy to
736 cap the total runtime to a given time.
738 time_based If set, fio will run for the duration of the runtime
739 specified even if the file(s) are completely read or
740 written. It will simply loop over the same workload
741 as many times as the runtime allows.
743 ramp_time=time If set, fio will run the specified workload for this amount
744 of time before logging any performance numbers. Useful for
745 letting performance settle before logging results, thus
746 minimizing the runtime required for stable results. Note
747 that the ramp_time is considered lead in time for a job,
748 thus it will increase the total runtime if a special timeout
749 or runtime is specified.
751 invalidate=bool Invalidate the buffer/page cache parts for this file prior
752 to starting io. Defaults to true.
754 sync=bool Use sync io for buffered writes. For the majority of the
755 io engines, this means using O_SYNC.
758 mem=str Fio can use various types of memory as the io unit buffer.
759 The allowed values are:
761 malloc Use memory from malloc(3) as the buffers.
763 shm Use shared memory as the buffers. Allocated
766 shmhuge Same as shm, but use huge pages as backing.
768 mmap Use mmap to allocate buffers. May either be
769 anonymous memory, or can be file backed if
770 a filename is given after the option. The
771 format is mem=mmap:/path/to/file.
773 mmaphuge Use a memory mapped huge file as the buffer
774 backing. Append filename after mmaphuge, ala
775 mem=mmaphuge:/hugetlbfs/file
777 The area allocated is a function of the maximum allowed
778 bs size for the job, multiplied by the io depth given. Note
779 that for shmhuge and mmaphuge to work, the system must have
780 free huge pages allocated. This can normally be checked
781 and set by reading/writing /proc/sys/vm/nr_hugepages on a
782 Linux system. Fio assumes a huge page is 4MB in size. So
783 to calculate the number of huge pages you need for a given
784 job file, add up the io depth of all jobs (normally one unless
785 iodepth= is used) and multiply by the maximum bs set. Then
786 divide that number by the huge page size. You can see the
787 size of the huge pages in /proc/meminfo. If no huge pages
788 are allocated by having a non-zero number in nr_hugepages,
789 using mmaphuge or shmhuge will fail. Also see hugepage-size.
791 mmaphuge also needs to have hugetlbfs mounted and the file
792 location should point there. So if it's mounted in /huge,
793 you would use mem=mmaphuge:/huge/somefile.
795 iomem_align=int This indiciates the memory alignment of the IO memory buffers.
796 Note that the given alignment is applied to the first IO unit
797 buffer, if using iodepth the alignment of the following buffers
798 are given by the bs used. In other words, if using a bs that is
799 a multiple of the page sized in the system, all buffers will
800 be aligned to this value. If using a bs that is not page
801 aligned, the alignment of subsequent IO memory buffers is the
802 sum of the iomem_align and bs used.
805 Defines the size of a huge page. Must at least be equal
806 to the system setting, see /proc/meminfo. Defaults to 4MB.
807 Should probably always be a multiple of megabytes, so using
808 hugepage-size=Xm is the preferred way to set this to avoid
809 setting a non-pow-2 bad value.
811 exitall When one job finishes, terminate the rest. The default is
812 to wait for each job to finish, sometimes that is not the
815 bwavgtime=int Average the calculated bandwidth over the given time. Value
816 is specified in milliseconds.
818 create_serialize=bool If true, serialize the file creating for the jobs.
819 This may be handy to avoid interleaving of data
820 files, which may greatly depend on the filesystem
821 used and even the number of processors in the system.
823 create_fsync=bool fsync the data file after creation. This is the
826 create_on_open=bool Don't pre-setup the files for IO, just create open()
827 when it's time to do IO to that file.
829 pre_read=bool If this is given, files will be pre-read into memory before
830 starting the given IO operation. This will also clear
831 the 'invalidate' flag, since it is pointless to pre-read
832 and then drop the cache. This will only work for IO engines
833 that are seekable, since they allow you to read the same data
834 multiple times. Thus it will not work on eg network or splice
837 unlink=bool Unlink the job files when done. Not the default, as repeated
838 runs of that job would then waste time recreating the file
841 loops=int Run the specified number of iterations of this job. Used
842 to repeat the same workload a given number of times. Defaults
845 do_verify=bool Run the verify phase after a write phase. Only makes sense if
846 verify is set. Defaults to 1.
848 verify=str If writing to a file, fio can verify the file contents
849 after each iteration of the job. The allowed values are:
851 md5 Use an md5 sum of the data area and store
852 it in the header of each block.
854 crc64 Use an experimental crc64 sum of the data
855 area and store it in the header of each
858 crc32c Use a crc32c sum of the data area and store
859 it in the header of each block.
861 crc32c-intel Use hardware assisted crc32c calcuation
862 provided on SSE4.2 enabled processors. Falls
863 back to regular software crc32c, if not
864 supported by the system.
866 crc32 Use a crc32 sum of the data area and store
867 it in the header of each block.
869 crc16 Use a crc16 sum of the data area and store
870 it in the header of each block.
872 crc7 Use a crc7 sum of the data area and store
873 it in the header of each block.
875 sha512 Use sha512 as the checksum function.
877 sha256 Use sha256 as the checksum function.
879 sha1 Use optimized sha1 as the checksum function.
881 meta Write extra information about each io
882 (timestamp, block number etc.). The block
883 number is verified. See also verify_pattern.
885 null Only pretend to verify. Useful for testing
886 internals with ioengine=null, not for much
889 This option can be used for repeated burn-in tests of a
890 system to make sure that the written data is also
891 correctly read back. If the data direction given is
892 a read or random read, fio will assume that it should
893 verify a previously written file. If the data direction
894 includes any form of write, the verify will be of the
897 verifysort=bool If set, fio will sort written verify blocks when it deems
898 it faster to read them back in a sorted manner. This is
899 often the case when overwriting an existing file, since
900 the blocks are already laid out in the file system. You
901 can ignore this option unless doing huge amounts of really
902 fast IO where the red-black tree sorting CPU time becomes
905 verify_offset=int Swap the verification header with data somewhere else
906 in the block before writing. Its swapped back before
909 verify_interval=int Write the verification header at a finer granularity
910 than the blocksize. It will be written for chunks the
911 size of header_interval. blocksize should divide this
914 verify_pattern=str If set, fio will fill the io buffers with this
915 pattern. Fio defaults to filling with totally random
916 bytes, but sometimes it's interesting to fill with a known
917 pattern for io verification purposes. Depending on the
918 width of the pattern, fio will fill 1/2/3/4 bytes of the
919 buffer at the time(it can be either a decimal or a hex number).
920 The verify_pattern if larger than a 32-bit quantity has to
921 be a hex number that starts with either "0x" or "0X". Use
924 verify_fatal=bool Normally fio will keep checking the entire contents
925 before quitting on a block verification failure. If this
926 option is set, fio will exit the job on the first observed
929 verify_async=int Fio will normally verify IO inline from the submitting
930 thread. This option takes an integer describing how many
931 async offload threads to create for IO verification instead,
932 causing fio to offload the duty of verifying IO contents
933 to one or more separate threads. If using this offload
934 option, even sync IO engines can benefit from using an
935 iodepth setting higher than 1, as it allows them to have
936 IO in flight while verifies are running.
938 verify_async_cpus=str Tell fio to set the given CPU affinity on the
939 async IO verification threads. See cpus_allowed for the
942 verify_backlog=int Fio will normally verify the written contents of a
943 job that utilizes verify once that job has completed. In
944 other words, everything is written then everything is read
945 back and verified. You may want to verify continually
946 instead for a variety of reasons. Fio stores the meta data
947 associated with an IO block in memory, so for large
948 verify workloads, quite a bit of memory would be used up
949 holding this meta data. If this option is enabled, fio
950 will write only N blocks before verifying these blocks.
952 will verify the previously written blocks before continuing
955 verify_backlog_batch=int Control how many blocks fio will verify
956 if verify_backlog is set. If not set, will default to
957 the value of verify_backlog (meaning the entire queue
958 is read back and verified). If verify_backlog_batch is
959 less than verify_backlog then not all blocks will be verified,
960 if verify_backlog_batch is larger than verify_backlog, some
961 blocks will be verified more than once.
963 stonewall Wait for preceeding jobs in the job file to exit, before
964 starting this one. Can be used to insert serialization
965 points in the job file. A stone wall also implies starting
966 a new reporting group.
968 new_group Start a new reporting group. If this option isn't given,
969 jobs in a file will be part of the same reporting group
970 unless separated by a stone wall (or if it's a group
971 by itself, with the numjobs option).
973 numjobs=int Create the specified number of clones of this job. May be
974 used to setup a larger number of threads/processes doing
975 the same thing. We regard that grouping of jobs as a
978 group_reporting If 'numjobs' is set, it may be interesting to display
979 statistics for the group as a whole instead of for each
980 individual job. This is especially true of 'numjobs' is
981 large, looking at individual thread/process output quickly
982 becomes unwieldy. If 'group_reporting' is specified, fio
983 will show the final report per-group instead of per-job.
985 thread fio defaults to forking jobs, however if this option is
986 given, fio will use pthread_create(3) to create threads
989 zonesize=int Divide a file into zones of the specified size. See zoneskip.
991 zoneskip=int Skip the specified number of bytes when zonesize data has
992 been read. The two zone options can be used to only do
993 io on zones of a file.
995 write_iolog=str Write the issued io patterns to the specified file. See
996 read_iolog. Specify a separate file for each job, otherwise
997 the iologs will be interspersed and the file may be corrupt.
999 read_iolog=str Open an iolog with the specified file name and replay the
1000 io patterns it contains. This can be used to store a
1001 workload and replay it sometime later. The iolog given
1002 may also be a blktrace binary file, which allows fio
1003 to replay a workload captured by blktrace. See blktrace
1004 for how to capture such logging data. For blktrace replay,
1005 the file needs to be turned into a blkparse binary data
1006 file first (blkparse <device> -o /dev/null -d file_for_fio.bin).
1008 replay_no_stall=int When replaying I/O with read_iolog the default behavior
1009 is to attempt to respect the time stamps within the log and
1010 replay them with the appropriate delay between IOPS. By
1011 setting this variable fio will not respect the timestamps and
1012 attempt to replay them as fast as possible while still
1013 respecting ordering. The result is the same I/O pattern to a
1014 given device, but different timings.
1016 replay_redirect=str While replaying I/O patterns using read_iolog the
1017 default behavior is to replay the IOPS onto the major/minor
1018 device that each IOP was recorded from. This is sometimes
1019 undesireable because on a different machine those major/minor
1020 numbers can map to a different device. Changing hardware on
1021 the same system can also result in a different major/minor
1022 mapping. Replay_redirect causes all IOPS to be replayed onto
1023 the single specified device regardless of the device it was
1024 recorded from. i.e. replay_redirect=/dev/sdc would cause all
1025 IO in the blktrace to be replayed onto /dev/sdc. This means
1026 multiple devices will be replayed onto a single, if the trace
1027 contains multiple devices. If you want multiple devices to be
1028 replayed concurrently to multiple redirected devices you must
1029 blkparse your trace into separate traces and replay them with
1030 independent fio invocations. Unfortuantely this also breaks
1031 the strict time ordering between multiple device accesses.
1033 write_bw_log=str If given, write a bandwidth log of the jobs in this job
1034 file. Can be used to store data of the bandwidth of the
1035 jobs in their lifetime. The included fio_generate_plots
1036 script uses gnuplot to turn these text files into nice
1037 graphs. See write_log_log for behaviour of given
1038 filename. For this option, the postfix is _bw.log.
1040 write_lat_log=str Same as write_bw_log, except that this option stores io
1041 submission, completion, and total latencies instead. If no
1042 filename is given with this option, the default filename of
1043 "jobname_type.log" is used. Even if the filename is given,
1044 fio will still append the type of log. So if one specifies
1048 The actual log names will be foo_slat.log, foo_slat.log,
1049 and foo_lat.log. This helps fio_generate_plot fine the logs
1052 lockmem=int Pin down the specified amount of memory with mlock(2). Can
1053 potentially be used instead of removing memory or booting
1054 with less memory to simulate a smaller amount of memory.
1056 exec_prerun=str Before running this job, issue the command specified
1059 exec_postrun=str After the job completes, issue the command specified
1062 ioscheduler=str Attempt to switch the device hosting the file to the specified
1063 io scheduler before running.
1065 cpuload=int If the job is a CPU cycle eater, attempt to use the specified
1066 percentage of CPU cycles.
1068 cpuchunks=int If the job is a CPU cycle eater, split the load into
1069 cycles of the given time. In microseconds.
1071 disk_util=bool Generate disk utilization statistics, if the platform
1072 supports it. Defaults to on.
1074 disable_lat=bool Disable measurements of total latency numbers. Useful
1075 only for cutting back the number of calls to gettimeofday,
1076 as that does impact performance at really high IOPS rates.
1077 Note that to really get rid of a large amount of these
1078 calls, this option must be used with disable_slat and
1081 disable_clat=bool Disable measurements of completion latency numbers. See
1084 disable_slat=bool Disable measurements of submission latency numbers. See
1087 disable_bw=bool Disable measurements of throughput/bandwidth numbers. See
1090 gtod_reduce=bool Enable all of the gettimeofday() reducing options
1091 (disable_clat, disable_slat, disable_bw) plus reduce
1092 precision of the timeout somewhat to really shrink
1093 the gettimeofday() call count. With this option enabled,
1094 we only do about 0.4% of the gtod() calls we would have
1095 done if all time keeping was enabled.
1097 gtod_cpu=int Sometimes it's cheaper to dedicate a single thread of
1098 execution to just getting the current time. Fio (and
1099 databases, for instance) are very intensive on gettimeofday()
1100 calls. With this option, you can set one CPU aside for
1101 doing nothing but logging current time to a shared memory
1102 location. Then the other threads/processes that run IO
1103 workloads need only copy that segment, instead of entering
1104 the kernel with a gettimeofday() call. The CPU set aside
1105 for doing these time calls will be excluded from other
1106 uses. Fio will manually clear it from the CPU mask of other
1109 continue_on_error=bool Normally fio will exit the job on the first observed
1110 failure. If this option is set, fio will continue the job when
1111 there is a 'non-fatal error' (EIO or EILSEQ) until the runtime
1112 is exceeded or the I/O size specified is completed. If this
1113 option is used, there are two more stats that are appended,
1114 the total error count and the first error. The error field
1115 given in the stats is the first error that was hit during the
1118 cgroup=str Add job to this control group. If it doesn't exist, it will
1119 be created. The system must have a mounted cgroup blkio
1120 mount point for this to work. If your system doesn't have it
1121 mounted, you can do so with:
1123 # mount -t cgroup -o blkio none /cgroup
1125 cgroup_weight=int Set the weight of the cgroup to this value. See
1126 the documentation that comes with the kernel, allowed values
1127 are in the range of 100..1000.
1129 cgroup_nodelete=bool Normally fio will delete the cgroups it has created after
1130 the job completion. To override this behavior and to leave
1131 cgroups around after the job completion, set cgroup_nodelete=1.
1132 This can be useful if one wants to inspect various cgroup
1133 files after job completion. Default: false
1135 uid=int Instead of running as the invoking user, set the user ID to
1136 this value before the thread/process does any work.
1138 gid=int Set group ID, see uid.
1140 6.0 Interpreting the output
1141 ---------------------------
1143 fio spits out a lot of output. While running, fio will display the
1144 status of the jobs created. An example of that would be:
1146 Threads: 1: [_r] [24.8% done] [ 13509/ 8334 kb/s] [eta 00h:01m:31s]
1148 The characters inside the square brackets denote the current status of
1149 each thread. The possible values (in typical life cycle order) are:
1153 P Thread setup, but not started.
1155 I Thread initialized, waiting.
1156 p Thread running pre-reading file(s).
1157 R Running, doing sequential reads.
1158 r Running, doing random reads.
1159 W Running, doing sequential writes.
1160 w Running, doing random writes.
1161 M Running, doing mixed sequential reads/writes.
1162 m Running, doing mixed random reads/writes.
1163 F Running, currently waiting for fsync()
1164 V Running, doing verification of written data.
1165 E Thread exited, not reaped by main thread yet.
1168 The other values are fairly self explanatory - number of threads
1169 currently running and doing io, rate of io since last check (read speed
1170 listed first, then write speed), and the estimated completion percentage
1171 and time for the running group. It's impossible to estimate runtime of
1172 the following groups (if any).
1174 When fio is done (or interrupted by ctrl-c), it will show the data for
1175 each thread, group of threads, and disks in that order. For each data
1176 direction, the output looks like:
1178 Client1 (g=0): err= 0:
1179 write: io= 32MB, bw= 666KB/s, runt= 50320msec
1180 slat (msec): min= 0, max= 136, avg= 0.03, stdev= 1.92
1181 clat (msec): min= 0, max= 631, avg=48.50, stdev=86.82
1182 bw (KB/s) : min= 0, max= 1196, per=51.00%, avg=664.02, stdev=681.68
1183 cpu : usr=1.49%, sys=0.25%, ctx=7969, majf=0, minf=17
1184 IO depths : 1=0.1%, 2=0.3%, 4=0.5%, 8=99.0%, 16=0.0%, 32=0.0%, >32=0.0%
1185 submit : 0=0.0%, 4=100.0%, 8=0.0%, 16=0.0%, 32=0.0%, 64=0.0%, >=64=0.0%
1186 complete : 0=0.0%, 4=100.0%, 8=0.0%, 16=0.0%, 32=0.0%, 64=0.0%, >=64=0.0%
1187 issued r/w: total=0/32768, short=0/0
1188 lat (msec): 2=1.6%, 4=0.0%, 10=3.2%, 20=12.8%, 50=38.4%, 100=24.8%,
1189 lat (msec): 250=15.2%, 500=0.0%, 750=0.0%, 1000=0.0%, >=2048=0.0%
1191 The client number is printed, along with the group id and error of that
1192 thread. Below is the io statistics, here for writes. In the order listed,
1195 io= Number of megabytes io performed
1196 bw= Average bandwidth rate
1197 runt= The runtime of that thread
1198 slat= Submission latency (avg being the average, stdev being the
1199 standard deviation). This is the time it took to submit
1200 the io. For sync io, the slat is really the completion
1201 latency, since queue/complete is one operation there. This
1202 value can be in milliseconds or microseconds, fio will choose
1203 the most appropriate base and print that. In the example
1204 above, milliseconds is the best scale.
1205 clat= Completion latency. Same names as slat, this denotes the
1206 time from submission to completion of the io pieces. For
1207 sync io, clat will usually be equal (or very close) to 0,
1208 as the time from submit to complete is basically just
1209 CPU time (io has already been done, see slat explanation).
1210 bw= Bandwidth. Same names as the xlat stats, but also includes
1211 an approximate percentage of total aggregate bandwidth
1212 this thread received in this group. This last value is
1213 only really useful if the threads in this group are on the
1214 same disk, since they are then competing for disk access.
1215 cpu= CPU usage. User and system time, along with the number
1216 of context switches this thread went through, usage of
1217 system and user time, and finally the number of major
1218 and minor page faults.
1219 IO depths= The distribution of io depths over the job life time. The
1220 numbers are divided into powers of 2, so for example the
1221 16= entries includes depths up to that value but higher
1222 than the previous entry. In other words, it covers the
1223 range from 16 to 31.
1224 IO submit= How many pieces of IO were submitting in a single submit
1225 call. Each entry denotes that amount and below, until
1226 the previous entry - eg, 8=100% mean that we submitted
1227 anywhere in between 5-8 ios per submit call.
1228 IO complete= Like the above submit number, but for completions instead.
1229 IO issued= The number of read/write requests issued, and how many
1231 IO latencies= The distribution of IO completion latencies. This is the
1232 time from when IO leaves fio and when it gets completed.
1233 The numbers follow the same pattern as the IO depths,
1234 meaning that 2=1.6% means that 1.6% of the IO completed
1235 within 2 msecs, 20=12.8% means that 12.8% of the IO
1236 took more than 10 msecs, but less than (or equal to) 20 msecs.
1238 After each client has been listed, the group statistics are printed. They
1239 will look like this:
1241 Run status group 0 (all jobs):
1242 READ: io=64MB, aggrb=22178, minb=11355, maxb=11814, mint=2840msec, maxt=2955msec
1243 WRITE: io=64MB, aggrb=1302, minb=666, maxb=669, mint=50093msec, maxt=50320msec
1245 For each data direction, it prints:
1247 io= Number of megabytes io performed.
1248 aggrb= Aggregate bandwidth of threads in this group.
1249 minb= The minimum average bandwidth a thread saw.
1250 maxb= The maximum average bandwidth a thread saw.
1251 mint= The smallest runtime of the threads in that group.
1252 maxt= The longest runtime of the threads in that group.
1254 And finally, the disk statistics are printed. They will look like this:
1256 Disk stats (read/write):
1257 sda: ios=16398/16511, merge=30/162, ticks=6853/819634, in_queue=826487, util=100.00%
1259 Each value is printed for both reads and writes, with reads first. The
1262 ios= Number of ios performed by all groups.
1263 merge= Number of merges io the io scheduler.
1264 ticks= Number of ticks we kept the disk busy.
1265 io_queue= Total time spent in the disk queue.
1266 util= The disk utilization. A value of 100% means we kept the disk
1267 busy constantly, 50% would be a disk idling half of the time.
1273 For scripted usage where you typically want to generate tables or graphs
1274 of the results, fio can output the results in a semicolon separated format.
1275 The format is one long line of values, such as:
1277 2;card0;0;0;7139336;121836;60004;1;10109;27.932460;116.933948;220;126861;3495.446807;1085.368601;226;126864;3523.635629;1089.012448;24063;99944;50.275485%;59818.274627;5540.657370;7155060;122104;60004;1;8338;29.086342;117.839068;388;128077;5032.488518;1234.785715;391;128085;5061.839412;1236.909129;23436;100928;50.287926%;59964.832030;5644.844189;14.595833%;19.394167%;123706;0;7313;0.1%;0.1%;0.1%;0.1%;0.1%;0.1%;100.0%;0.00%;0.00%;0.00%;0.00%;0.00%;0.00%;0.01%;0.02%;0.05%;0.16%;6.04%;40.40%;52.68%;0.64%;0.01%;0.00%;0.01%;0.00%;0.00%;0.00%;0.00%;0.00%
1278 A description of this job goes here.
1280 The job description (if provided) follows on a second line.
1282 To enable terse output, use the --minimal command line option. The first
1283 value is the version of the terse output format. If the output has to
1284 be changed for some reason, this number will be incremented by 1 to
1285 signify that change.
1287 Split up, the format is as follows:
1289 version, jobname, groupid, error
1291 KB IO, bandwidth (KB/sec), runtime (msec)
1292 Submission latency: min, max, mean, deviation
1293 Completion latency: min, max, mean, deviation
1294 Total latency: min, max, mean, deviation
1295 Bw: min, max, aggregate percentage of total, mean, deviation
1297 KB IO, bandwidth (KB/sec), runtime (msec)
1298 Submission latency: min, max, mean, deviation
1299 Completion latency: min, max, mean, deviation
1300 Total latency: min, max, mean, deviation
1301 Bw: min, max, aggregate percentage of total, mean, deviation
1302 CPU usage: user, system, context switches, major faults, minor faults
1303 IO depths: <=1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, >=64
1304 IO latencies microseconds: <=2, 4, 10, 20, 50, 100, 250, 500, 750, 1000
1305 IO latencies milliseconds: <=2, 4, 10, 20, 50, 100, 250, 500, 750, 1000, 2000, >=2000
1306 Additional Info (dependant on continue_on_error, default off): total # errors, first error code
1308 Additional Info (dependant on description being set): Text description
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