cargo-check(1)

Check a local package and all of its dependencies for errors. This will essentially compile the packages without performing the final step of code generation, which is faster than running cargo build. The compiler will save metadata files to disk so that future runs will reuse them if the source has not been modified. Some diagnostics and errors are only emitted during code generation, so they inherently won’t be reported with cargo check.

OPTIONS

Package Selection

By default, when no package selection options are given, the packages selected depend on the selected manifest file (based on the current working directory if --manifest-path is not given). If the manifest is the root of a workspace then the workspaces default members are selected, otherwise only the package defined by the manifest will be selected.

The default members of a workspace can be set explicitly with the workspace.default-members key in the root manifest. If this is not set, a virtual workspace will include all workspace members (equivalent to passing --workspace), and a non-virtual workspace will include only the root crate itself.

-p spec…
--package spec…: Check only the specified packages. See cargo-pkgid(1) for the SPEC format. This flag may be specified multiple times and supports common Unix glob patterns like *, ? and []. However, to avoid your shell accidentally expanding glob patterns before Cargo handles them, you must use single quotes or double quotes around each pattern.
--workspace: Check all members in the workspace.
--all: Deprecated alias for --workspace.
--exclude SPEC…: Exclude the specified packages. Must be used in conjunction with the --workspace flag. This flag may be specified multiple times and supports common Unix glob patterns like *, ? and []. However, to avoid your shell accidentally expanding glob patterns before Cargo handles them, you must use single quotes or double quotes around each pattern.

Target Selection

When no target selection options are given, cargo check will check all binary and library targets of the selected packages. Binaries are skipped if they have required-features that are missing.

Passing target selection flags will check only the specified targets.

Note that --bin, --example, --test and --bench flags also support common Unix glob patterns like *, ? and []. However, to avoid your shell accidentally expanding glob patterns before Cargo handles them, you must use single quotes or double quotes around each glob pattern.

--lib: Check the package’s library.
--bin name…: Check the specified binary. This flag may be specified multiple times and supports common Unix glob patterns.
--bins: Check all binary targets.
--example name…: Check the specified example. This flag may be specified multiple times and supports common Unix glob patterns.
--examples: Check all example targets.
--test name…: Check the specified integration test. This flag may be specified multiple times and supports common Unix glob patterns.
--tests: Check all targets that have the test = true manifest flag set. By default this includes the library and binaries built as unittests, and integration tests. Be aware that this will also build any required dependencies, so the lib target may be built twice (once as a unittest, and once as a dependency for binaries, integration tests, etc.). Targets may be enabled or disabled by setting the test flag in the manifest settings for the target.
--bench name…: Check the specified benchmark. This flag may be specified multiple times and supports common Unix glob patterns.
--benches: Check all targets that have the bench = true manifest flag set. By default this includes the library and binaries built as benchmarks, and bench targets. Be aware that this will also build any required dependencies, so the lib target may be built twice (once as a benchmark, and once as a dependency for binaries, benchmarks, etc.). Targets may be enabled or disabled by setting the bench flag in the manifest settings for the target.
--all-targets: Check all targets. This is equivalent to specifying --lib --bins --tests --benches --examples.

Feature Selection

The feature flags allow you to control which features are enabled. When no feature options are given, the default feature is activated for every selected package.

See the features documentation for more details.

-F features
--features features: Space or comma separated list of features to activate. Features of workspace members may be enabled with package-name/feature-name syntax. This flag may be specified multiple times, which enables all specified features.
--all-features: Activate all available features of all selected packages.
--no-default-features: Do not activate the default feature of the selected packages.

Compilation Options

--target triple

Check for the given architecture. The default is the host architecture. The general format of the triple is <arch><sub>-<vendor>-<sys>-<abi>. Run rustc --print target-list for a list of supported targets. This flag may be specified multiple times.

This may also be specified with the build.target config value.

Note that specifying this flag makes Cargo run in a different mode where the target artifacts are placed in a separate directory. See the build cache documentation for more details.

-r

--release

Check optimized artifacts with the release profile. See also the --profile option for choosing a specific profile by name.

--profile name

Check with the given profile.

As a special case, specifying the test profile will also enable checking in test mode which will enable checking tests and enable the test cfg option. See rustc tests for more detail.

See the reference for more details on profiles.

--timings=fmts

Output information how long each compilation takes, and track concurrency information over time. Accepts an optional comma-separated list of output formats; --timings without an argument will default to --timings=html. Specifying an output format (rather than the default) is unstable and requires -Zunstable-options. Valid output formats:

html (unstable, requires -Zunstable-options): Write a human-readable file cargo-timing.html to the target/cargo-timings directory with a report of the compilation. Also write a report to the same directory with a timestamp in the filename if you want to look at older runs. HTML output is suitable for human consumption only, and does not provide machine-readable timing data.
json (unstable, requires -Zunstable-options): Emit machine-readable JSON information about timing information.

Output Options

--target-dir directory: Directory for all generated artifacts and intermediate files. May also be specified with the CARGO_TARGET_DIR environment variable, or the build.target-dir config value. Defaults to target in the root of the workspace.

Display Options

-v

--verbose

Use verbose output. May be specified twice for “very verbose” output which includes extra output such as dependency warnings and build script output. May also be specified with the term.verbose config value.

-q

--quiet

Do not print cargo log messages. May also be specified with the term.quiet config value.

--color when

Control when colored output is used. Valid values:

auto (default): Automatically detect if color support is available on the terminal.
always: Always display colors.
never: Never display colors.

May also be specified with the term.color config value.

--message-format fmt

The output format for diagnostic messages. Can be specified multiple times and consists of comma-separated values. Valid values:

human (default): Display in a human-readable text format. Conflicts with short and json.
short: Emit shorter, human-readable text messages. Conflicts with human and json.
json: Emit JSON messages to stdout. See the reference for more details. Conflicts with human and short.
json-diagnostic-short: Ensure the rendered field of JSON messages contains the “short” rendering from rustc. Cannot be used with human or short.
json-diagnostic-rendered-ansi: Ensure the rendered field of JSON messages contains embedded ANSI color codes for respecting rustc’s default color scheme. Cannot be used with human or short.
json-render-diagnostics: Instruct Cargo to not include rustc diagnostics in JSON messages printed, but instead Cargo itself should render the JSON diagnostics coming from rustc. Cargo’s own JSON diagnostics and others coming from rustc are still emitted. Cannot be used with human or short.

Manifest Options

--manifest-path path

Path to the Cargo.toml file. By default, Cargo searches for the Cargo.toml file in the current directory or any parent directory.

--ignore-rust-version

Ignore rust-version specification in packages.

--locked

Asserts that the exact same dependencies and versions are used as when the existing Cargo.lock file was originally generated. Cargo will exit with an error when either of the following scenarios arises:

The lock file is missing.
Cargo attempted to change the lock file due to a different dependency resolution.

It may be used in environments where deterministic builds are desired, such as in CI pipelines.

--offline

Prevents Cargo from accessing the network for any reason. Without this flag, Cargo will stop with an error if it needs to access the network and the network is not available. With this flag, Cargo will attempt to proceed without the network if possible.

Beware that this may result in different dependency resolution than online mode. Cargo will restrict itself to crates that are downloaded locally, even if there might be a newer version as indicated in the local copy of the index. See the cargo-fetch(1) command to download dependencies before going offline.

May also be specified with the net.offline config value.

--frozen

Equivalent to specifying both --locked and --offline.

--lockfile-path PATH

Changes the path of the lockfile from the default (<workspace_root>/Cargo.lock) to PATH. PATH must end with Cargo.lock (e.g. --lockfile-path /tmp/temporary-lockfile/Cargo.lock). Note that providing --lockfile-path will ignore existing lockfile at the default path, and instead will either use the lockfile from PATH, or write a new lockfile into the provided PATH if it doesn’t exist. This flag can be used to run most commands in read-only directories, writing lockfile into the provided PATH.

This option is only available on the nightly channel and requires the -Z unstable-options flag to enable (see #14421).

Common Options

+toolchain

If Cargo has been installed with rustup, and the first argument to cargo begins with +, it will be interpreted as a rustup toolchain name (such as +stable or +nightly). See the rustup documentation for more information about how toolchain overrides work.

--config KEY=VALUE or PATH

Overrides a Cargo configuration value. The argument should be in TOML syntax of KEY=VALUE, or provided as a path to an extra configuration file. This flag may be specified multiple times. See the command-line overrides section for more information.

-C PATH

Changes the current working directory before executing any specified operations. This affects things like where cargo looks by default for the project manifest (Cargo.toml), as well as the directories searched for discovering .cargo/config.toml, for example. This option must appear before the command name, for example cargo -C path/to/my-project build.

This option is only available on the nightly channel and requires the -Z unstable-options flag to enable (see #10098).

-h

--help

Prints help information.

-Z flag

Unstable (nightly-only) flags to Cargo. Run cargo -Z help for details.

Miscellaneous Options

-j N

--jobs N

Number of parallel jobs to run. May also be specified with the build.jobs config value. Defaults to the number of logical CPUs. If negative, it sets the maximum number of parallel jobs to the number of logical CPUs plus provided value. If a string default is provided, it sets the value back to defaults. Should not be 0.

--keep-going

Build as many crates in the dependency graph as possible, rather than aborting the build on the first one that fails to build.

For example if the current package depends on dependencies fails and works, one of which fails to build, cargo check -j1 may or may not build the one that succeeds (depending on which one of the two builds Cargo picked to run first), whereas cargo check -j1 --keep-going would definitely run both builds, even if the one run first fails.

--future-incompat-report

Displays a future-incompat report for any future-incompatible warnings produced during execution of this command

See cargo-report(1)

ENVIRONMENT

See the reference for details on environment variables that Cargo reads.

EXIT STATUS

0: Cargo succeeded.
101: Cargo failed to complete.

EXAMPLES

Check the local package for errors:
```
cargo check
```

Check all targets, including unit tests:

cargo check --all-targets --profile=test

The Cargo Book