Home » C programs » C file handling programs

C program to check a specified file exists or not using the stat() function

Here, we are going to learn how to check a specified file exists or not using the stat() function using C program?
Submitted by Nidhi, on August 13, 2021

Problem statement

Given a file path, we have to check whether a specified file exist or not using the stat() function.

C program to check a specified file exists or not using the stat() function

The source code to check a specified file exists or not using the stat() function is given below. The given program is compiled and executed using GCC compile on UBUNTU 18.04 OS successfully.

// C program to check a specified file exist or not 
// using stat() function

#include <stdio.h>
#include <sys/stat.h>

int main(void)
{
	struct stat buff;
    	int isFileExist = 0;
    
    	isFileExist = stat("includehelp.txt",&buff);
    
    	if(isFileExist == 0)
	{
		printf("file exists.\n");
		return 1;
    	}
	
	printf("file does not exists.\n");
    
    	return 0;
}

Output

file exists.

Explanation

Here, we checked file "includehelp.txt" exists in the current directory or not using the stat() function. Then printed the appropriate message on the console screen.

C File Handling Programs »