If I know the PID number of a process, how can I get its name?

Question

If I have the PID number for a process (on a UNIX machine), how can I find out the name of its associated process?

What do I have to do?

@Eddy_Em that'll give you the executable file, which isn't always the process name. Also, that's not portable... — derobert, Aug 21 '13 at 21:44

score 385 · Accepted Answer · edited May 04 '20 at 18:11

385

On all POSIX-compliant systems, and with Linux, you can use ps:

ps -p 1337 -o comm=

Here, the process is selected by its PID with -p. The -o option specifies the output format, comm meaning the command name.

For the full command, not just the name of the program, use:

ps -p 1337 -o command

See also: ps – The Open Group Base Specifications Issue 6

edited May 04 '20 at 18:11

Scott Skiles

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answered Aug 17 '13 at 08:21

slhck

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comm seems to truncate the command to 15 characters. Using `command` instead fixes it. – Nemo Aug 15 '14 at 17:10
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[Ubuntu 14.04.4 LTS] `$ ps -p 1 -o comm=` init `$ ps -p 1 -o command=` /sbin/init; which means it is not about 15 characters, maybe just the binary's name vs. its full path. – OmarOthman Jul 23 '16 at 09:48
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Actually, `comm` gives the binary's name and `command` returns argument 0 – robbie Jan 01 '17 at 22:04

score 63 · Answer 2 · edited Mar 30 '20 at 18:18

63

You can find the process name or the command used by the process-id or pid from

/proc/<pid>/cmdline

by doing

cat /proc/<pid>/cmdline

Here pid is the pid for which you want to find the name
For example:

 # ps aux

   ................
   ................
   user  2480  0.0  1.2 119100 12728 pts/0  Sl   22:42   0:01 gnome-terminal
   ................
   ................

To find the process name used by pid 2480 you use can

# cat /proc/2480/cmdline 

 gnome-terminal

edited Mar 30 '20 at 18:18

Vishrant

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answered Aug 17 '13 at 08:04

Stormvirux

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Be careful: The OP mentions UNIX. Not all UNIXes implement the Plan 9 like process-specific file. Your answer generally only applies to Linux. – slhck Aug 17 '13 at 08:08
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Whilst that's true, they did tag the question "linux". Anyone who is using a non-Linux based UNIX OS will be quite used to having to modify answers to fit their needs – Andrew White May 09 '17 at 03:33

Pedro Lobito · Answer 3 · 2020-05-22T16:16:35.087

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To get the path of of the program using a certain pid you can use:

ps ax|egrep "^ [PID]"

alternatively you can use:

ps -a [PID]

Or also:

readlink /proc/[PID]/exe

edited May 22 '20 at 16:16

answered Apr 18 '15 at 02:16

Pedro Lobito

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`ps -a` list all the processes that is associated with the terminal, it doesn't take any input. – Mike Lee Mar 10 '16 at 18:30
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@MichaelLee I guess it depenends on the `ps` version, on `procps version 3.2.7` works fine. – Pedro Lobito May 27 '17 at 13:11

score 13 · Answer 4 · edited May 27 '17 at 05:33

13

You can use pmap. I am searching for PID 6649. And cutting off the extra process details.

$ pmap 6649 | head -1
6649:   /usr/lib64/firefox/firefox

edited May 27 '17 at 05:33

Scott - Слава Україні

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answered May 27 '17 at 04:28

Mike Studer

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This command helped me more than I needed, I have the full line of the process that started. Given a Java process, with the `ps` command all you'll see is just `java`, but the rest of parameters passed will be displayed fully with `pmap`. – Daniel Andrei Mincă Aug 31 '18 at 07:21

score 9 · Answer 5 · answered May 06 '16 at 00:14

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# ls -la /proc/ID_GOES_HERE/exe

Example:

# ls -la /proc/1374/exe
lrwxrwxrwx 1 chmm chmm 0 Mai  5 20:46 /proc/1374/exe -> /usr/bin/telegram-desktop

answered May 06 '16 at 00:14

Carlos H. M. Moreira

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This one is perfect. – jayarjo Nov 17 '16 at 17:58
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Probably better: `readlink /proc/1337/exe`. readlink - print resolved symbolic links or canonical file names. – Pablo A Mar 06 '18 at 00:58
Some one commented on the question that the executable name is not always the process name, e.g. gunicorn or nginx. Some processes will change it at runtime with `setprocname` – ttimasdf Nov 26 '19 at 02:44
However if I want the executable name, this `/proc` way is perfect. – ttimasdf Nov 26 '19 at 02:45

Gangadhar · Answer 6 · 2013-08-17T11:25:53.777

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You can Also use awk in combination with ps

ps aux | awk '$2 == PID number for a process  { print $0 }'

example:

root@cprogrammer:~# ps aux | awk '$2 == 1 { print $0 }'
root         1  0.0  0.2  24476  2436 ?        Ss   15:38   0:01 /sbin/init

to print HEAD LINE you can use

 ps --headers aux |head -n 1 && ps aux | awk '$2 == 1 { print $0 }'

                 (or) 

 ps --headers aux |head -n 1; ps aux | awk '$2 == 1 { print $0 }'


root@cprogrammer:~# ps --headers aux |head -n 1 && ps aux | awk '$2 == 1 { print $0 }'
USER       PID %CPU %MEM    VSZ   RSS TTY      STAT START   TIME COMMAND
root         1  0.0  0.2  24476  2436 ?        Ss   15:38   0:01 /sbin/init

edited Aug 17 '13 at 11:25

answered Aug 17 '13 at 09:32

Gangadhar

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This is unstable since it'd also select processes that happen to include the number anywhere in their command. Try `ps ax | grep 1` and see whether it really returns the `init` process, for example. (In my case, it returns 119 lines—not desirable.) – slhck Aug 17 '13 at 09:41
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@slhck Modified the answer... thanks for info.. **ps -p 1 -o comm=** is best option for this question. – Gangadhar Aug 17 '13 at 11:07
We don't need two runs to retain headers, instead use `ps aux | awk 'NR==1 || $2==PID'` -- and don't need to say `{print $0}` because it's the default. But as you commented, `-p` is better anyway. – dave_thompson_085 May 06 '16 at 04:38

score 3 · Answer 7 · answered Feb 23 '16 at 21:47

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Surprisingly, no one has mentioned the -f (full command) option for ps. I like to use it with -e (everything) and pipe the results to grep so I can narrow my search.

ps -ef | grep <PID>

This is also very useful for looking at full commands that someone is running that are taking a lot of resources on your system. This will show you the options and arguments passed to the command.

answered Feb 23 '16 at 21:47

jdelaporte

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Doesn't work on BSD (maybe including MacOSX? I'm not sure). Even where `-e -f` are available, `grep` can produce many false matches e.g. `grep 33` includes pid=933 or 339, ppid=33 or 933 or 339, timeused of 33 seconds or 33 minutes, or programname or argument containing 33 -- including the `grep` itself. All (AFAIK) `ps` do have `-p`, so just `ps -fp 33`. – dave_thompson_085 May 06 '16 at 04:41

score 3 · Answer 8 · edited Mar 20 '17 at 10:04

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Simmilar to slhck's Answer, but relying on file operations instead of command invocations:

MYPID=1
cat "/proc/$MYPID/comm"

edited Mar 20 '17 at 10:04

Community

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answered Aug 30 '15 at 23:31

ThorSummoner

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[Ubuntu 14.04.4 LTS] `cat /proc/1/comm` => init, not /sbin/init. His answer has the longer version included. But +1 anyway. – OmarOthman Jul 23 '16 at 22:17

score 0 · Answer 9 · edited Nov 21 '16 at 16:15

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I find the easiest method to be with the following command:

ps -awxs | grep pid

edited Nov 21 '16 at 16:15

Gaff

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answered Nov 21 '16 at 09:48

user666282

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Apart from being highly inefficient compared to `ps -p${pid}`, this will pick up plenty of false positives - including the `grep` itself. – Toby Speight Nov 22 '16 at 16:55

score 0 · Answer 10 · answered Jun 27 '22 at 23:58

0

If you want to see the path of the process by PID. You can use the pwdx command. The pwdx command reports the full path of the PID process.

$ pwdx 13896
13896: /home/user/python_program

Source: https://stackoverflow.com/a/63447358/6077264

answered Jun 27 '22 at 23:58

Hieu Nguyen

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Bokili Production · Answer 11 · 2022-07-12T17:07:36.327

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You can also use this command:

cat /proc/PID/comm

It also works without root.

edited Jul 12 '22 at 17:07

answered Jul 12 '22 at 17:06

Bokili Production

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same answer was given 9 years ago ! – Toto Jul 12 '22 at 17:31

If I know the PID number of a process, how can I get its name?

11 Answers11