Boost Your Remote File Transfers with trzsz – A TMUX‑Compatible Alternative to rz/sz

Overview

trzsz (trz/tsz) is a file‑transfer utility written in Python with additional Go and JavaScript implementations. It is compatible with tmux, provides progress bars, supports whole‑directory transfer, and allows drag‑and‑drop uploads. The tool works in terminals such as iTerm2, Tabby, Electerm, and TTYD.

Installation

Ubuntu (APT)

# sudo apt update && sudo apt install software-properties-common
# sudo add-apt-repository ppa:trzsz/ppa && sudo apt update
# sudo apt install trzsz

Debian (APT)

# sudo apt install curl gpg
# curl -s 'https://keyserver.ubuntu.com/pks/lookup?op=get&search=0x7074ce75da7cc691c1ae1a7c7e51d1ad956055ca' \
    | gpg --dearmor -o /usr/share/keyrings/trzsz.gpg
# echo 'deb [signed-by=/usr/share/keyrings/trzsz.gpg] https://ppa.launchpadcontent.net/trzsz/ppa/ubuntu jammy main' \
    | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/trzsz.list
# sudo apt update
# sudo apt install trzsz

CentOS / Fedora (YUM)

echo '[trzsz]
name=Trzsz Repo
baseurl=https://yum.fury.io/trzsz/
enabled=1
gpgcheck=0' | sudo tee /etc/yum.repos.d/trzsz.repo
sudo yum install trzsz

macOS (Homebrew)

brew update
brew install trzsz-go

Windows (Scoop)

scoop bucket add extras
scoop install trzsz

Build from source (GitHub)

git clone https://github.com/trzsz/trzsz-go.git
cd trzsz-go
make
sudo make install

Command‑line usage

Uploading files with trz

trz [-h] [-v] [-q] [-y] [-b] [-e] [-d] [-B N] [-t N] [path]

-h : display help and exit

-v : show version and exit

-q : hide progress bar during transfer

-y : overwrite existing files with the same name

-b : binary mode (faster for compressed files, images, media)

-e : escape all known control characters

-d : specify a file or directory to upload/download

-B N : set maximum buffer size (default 10M)

-t N : set timeout in seconds (default 20; 0 or negative disables timeout)

path : destination directory on the remote host (default: current directory)

Running trz without arguments uploads the files in the local working directory to the remote server’s current directory. To upload to a specific directory, provide the path, e.g., trz /opt.

Start a transfer session over SSH: trzsz ssh <em>IP_ADDRESS</em> For directory upload, add the -d flag:

trzsz -d ssh <em>IP_ADDRESS</em>

Downloading files with tsz

tsz [-h] [-v] [-q] [-y] [-b] [-e] [-d] [-B N] [-t N] file [file ...]

file : name of the file to download; supports relative or absolute paths, wildcards, and multiple files

Example:

# tsz file1 file2 file3

References

trzsz: https://github.com/trzsz/trzsz

trzsz‑go: https://github.com/trzsz/trzsz-go

trzsz‑js: https://github.com/trzsz/trzsz.js

Chinese documentation: https://trzsz.github.io/cn/