How do I find out my screen resolution from a shell script?

Question

score 62 · Accepted Answer · edited Feb 14 '17 at 07:29

62

xdpyinfo | grep dimensions | sed -r 's/^[^0-9]*([0-9]+x[0-9]+).*$/\1/'

Command xdpyinfo displays various information about your X server. It writes a lot of things to the standard output but we only need the line starting with the word dimensions, thus we use grep. Finally we use sed to clean the result.

edited Feb 14 '17 at 07:29

Community

1

answered Oct 06 '10 at 14:55

If you need x and y axis dimension separately, you can do the following. First, put the result of the above command into a variable using `$( )` syntax (i.e. `DIMENSIONS=$(xdpyinfo ...`). Then use `sed` again to get the two: `WIDTH=$(echo $DIMENSIONS | sed -r 's/x.*//')` and `HEIGHT=$(echo $DIMENSIONS | sed -r 's/.*x//')`. – mneri Feb 15 '17 at 16:57
`xdpyinfo` prints an error message if it cannot access information, so error redirection to `/dev/null`. For this reason you may want to add an error redirection: `xdpyinfo 2> /dev/null`. So, the full piple looks like this: `xdpyinfo 2> /dev/null | grep dimensions | sed -r 's/^[^0-9]*([0-9]+x[0-9]+).*$/\1/'`. This will make your script more solid. – mneri Feb 15 '17 at 19:11
1

`xdpyinfo | grep dimensions: | awk '{print $2}'` seems to be simpler and more readable. – x-yuri Dec 04 '19 at 08:15
I was looking for something simpler that did not use XWindows, and found this answer for my needs. https://stackoverflow.com/questions/263890/how-do-i-find-the-width-height-of-a-terminal-window – PatS May 04 '22 at 17:02

score 32 · Answer 2 · edited Sep 15 '15 at 08:08

32

xdpyinfo | grep dimensions will give you the total resolution, if you have multiple monitors it will be the sum of all of them. xrandr --current will give you the resolution for each monitor.

I use this snippet to find the maximum possible resolution for rDesktop without going to full screen:

Xaxis=$(xrandr --current | grep '*' | uniq | awk '{print $1}' | cut -d 'x' -f1)

Yaxis=$(xrandr --current | grep '*' | uniq | awk '{print $1}' | cut -d 'x' -f2)

Output:

Xaxis = 1280
Yaxis = 1024

Minus windows decoration (more or less):

MaxRes=$(($Xaxis-5))"x"$(($Yaxis-25))

Output:

MaxRes = 1275x999

Which is the max resolution for rDesktop without going full screen.

End command:

rdesktop -u $User -P -z -5 -g $MaxRes $Host &

It works fine so far but I haven't tested thoroughly though.

Another example is for screencast with avconv:

avconv -f x11grab -r 15 -s `xrandr --current | grep  '*' | uniq | awk '{print $1}'` -i :0.0 -c:v libx264 ./output.mp4

edited Sep 15 '15 at 08:08

pabloab

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answered Sep 22 '11 at 16:44

Eliezer E. Vargas

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it says> `xdpyinfo: Unable to open display "".` – To Kra Dec 14 '15 at 09:27
How do you find out the available modes to change to? – CMCDragonkai Feb 08 '16 at 06:32
If you don't need to subtract for window decoration (etc), you can do this in a one-liner `rdesktop [other_args] -g $(xrandr --current | grep '*' | uniq | awk '{print $1}')`. – c24w Oct 12 '16 at 19:14
It's not the sum for multiple monitors. It's the dimensions of a bounding box which contains all the monitors. – Dennis Williamson May 17 '19 at 20:25
`xrandr --current | grep '*' | awk -v line="$SCREEN" 'NR==line{print $1}' | cut -d 'x' -f1` if you want to specify a screen (with a multi-monitor setup) (`SCREEN` is 1-indexed) – SapuSeven Oct 25 '19 at 10:10

score 5 · Answer 3 · answered Oct 06 '10 at 14:54

5

You could use the xrandr -q command. From that you can create a shell script if needed.

For more information on the command go here or type man xrandr

answered Oct 06 '10 at 14:54

ricbax

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abu_bua · Answer 4 · 2020-07-08T19:11:04.170

4

A very simple method is to read out the modes file in the sys-directory:

cat /sys/class/graphics/*/modes

or respectively

cat /sys/class/graphics/*/virtual_size

edited Jul 08 '20 at 19:11

answered Jul 08 '20 at 19:02

abu_bua

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I think this is the best answer for linux. – Jason Stewart Apr 26 '22 at 22:01

JimmyLandStudios · Answer 5 · 2015-11-07T14:33:16.153

2

#############################################
## I use this with a Video Recording Program.
#  window size --root option - information on the screen's root window
echo $(xwininfo -root | grep 'geometry' | awk '{print $2;}')
# output(s): 1024x768+0+0
#            height x width + x + y positions.
######################
## Reference Manual ##
man xwininfo

edited Nov 07 '15 at 14:33

answered Nov 07 '15 at 14:26

JimmyLandStudios

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I used `xwininfo -root|sed '/Height/!d;s/.* //'` for height and `xwininfo -root|sed '/Width/!d;s/.* //'` for width. – dessert Apr 19 '18 at 19:42
geo=``xwininfo -root | grep 'geometry' | awk '{print $2;}'`` s=${geo%+0+0} ; This is how my BASH script is for 'avconv -s $s' – JimmyLandStudios Mar 03 '20 at 14:16

campisano · Answer 6 · 2017-05-09T03:23:13.333

Two possible alternatives produced combining the answers of @user31752 and @eliezer-e-vargas

A simpler regex:

$ xrandr --current | sed -n 's/.* connected \([0-9]*\)x\([0-9]*\)+.*/\1x\2/p'
1440x900

or using cut:

$ xrandr --current | grep ' connected ' | cut -d ' ' -f 3 | cut -d '+' -f 1
1440x900

The use of grep '*' | uniq from @eliezer-e-vargas get a different line (ex. " 1440x900 59.90*+ 59.89" ) of xrandr output, while the grep ' connected ' get a simple one (ex. "LVDS1 connected 1440x900+0+0 .....").

The use of regex by @user31752 is nice, so the line that I'm using needs a simpler regex, or can be substituted whit the simpler cut command.

Example xrandr output

$ xrandr --current
Screen 0: minimum 320 x 200, current 1440 x 900, maximum 8192 x 8192
LVDS1 connected 1440x900+0+0 (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) 331mm x 207mm
   1440x900      59.90*+  59.89  
   1360x768      59.80    59.96  
   1152x864      60.00  
   1024x768      60.00  
   800x600       60.32    56.25  
   640x480       59.94  
VGA1 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)
HDMI1 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)
DP1 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)

Is there any reason for somebody to use these commands instead of the ones in [Eliezer E. Vargas’s answer](https://superuser.com/q/196532/150988#338697)? — Scott - Слава Україні, May 09 '17 at 01:54

score 1 · Answer 7 · answered Sep 26 '18 at 16:39

Reading the Monitor Screen Data

The vesa standard provides a method of how to read the monitor screen resolution.

Extended Display Identification Data (EDID): This standard defines data formats to carry configuration information, allowing optimum use of displays.

A monitor typically supports multiple resolutions and refreshrates. Of course someone will prefer the maximum (physical) one.

To read this monitor data, try one of these solutions:

edid-decode

If not installed, type

sudo apt install edid-decode

Then read the edid file

edid-decode /sys/class/drm/card0-eDP-1/edid

read-edid

Install with
```
sudo apt install read-edid 
```
Then read via i2c the screen monitor data and parse it
```
sudo get-edid | parse-edid
```
Hexdump the edid data

In case edid-tools are not installed, you can dump the edid hex-file, e.g.:
```
hd /sys/class/drm/card0-eDP-1/edid
```
To encrypt this hex file take a look at wiki or download the edid specifications.

If you dont have X and `xrandr` installed, `edid-decode` is a perfect tool when you want to know the supported resolutions of the connected monitor! — UlfR, Dec 16 '19 at 14:14

score 1 · Answer 8 · answered Oct 06 '10 at 14:55

1

xdpyinfo will do it, with some parsing. It gives a lot of info which you'll then have to dig the screen number, and dimensions from

answered Oct 06 '10 at 14:55

Rich Homolka

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score 0 · Answer 9 · answered Nov 20 '17 at 17:38

0

As in the accepted answer but less complicated:

xdpyinfo | grep dimensions

Example of output:

dimensions:    1366x768 pixels (361x203 millimeters)

answered Nov 20 '17 at 17:38

Billal Begueradj

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How do I find out my screen resolution from a shell script?

9 Answers9

Reading the Monitor Screen Data