How to install rsync on almalinux?

What you will read?

To install rsync on AlmaLinux, open your terminal and first make sure your system is up to date:

sudo dnf update -y

Next, check if rsync is already installed:

rsync --version

If you see version details, you’re good to go. Otherwise, install it with:

sudo dnf install rsync -y

Once the installation is complete, confirm it again:

rsync --version

You should now see the installed version along with copyright and protocol info.

Using rsync

Here’s a simple example of how to copy a directory from your local system to a remote server:

rsync -avz /path/to/local/dir/ user@remote_server:/path/to/remote/dir/

And if you want to sync from a remote server to your local system:

rsync -avz user@remote_server:/path/to/remote/dir/ /path/to/local/dir/

Add --delete if you want the destination to be an exact mirror:

rsync -avz --delete /source/ user@host:/destination/

For regular backups, you can create a simple shell script:

#!/bin/bash

rsync -avz --delete /home/user/data/ user@backup:/backup/data/

Make it executable:

chmod +x backup.sh

And schedule it with cron:

crontab -e

Example cron job to run it daily at midnight:

0 0 * * * /home/user/backup.sh

rsync uses SSH by default. Make sure port 22 is open:

sudo firewall-cmd --permanent --add-service=ssh
sudo firewall-cmd --reload

Or open a custom port if you’ve configured SSH differently:

sudo firewall-cmd --permanent --add-port=2222/tcp
sudo firewall-cmd --reload

To use rsync on a different SSH port:

rsync -avz -e "ssh -p 2222" /src/ user@host:/dst/

If you get command not found, double-check that rsync was installed properly.

If you’re syncing to/from remote servers and see connection issues, make sure:

sestatus

Temporarily disable SELinux (not recommended for production):

sudo setenforce 0

That’s it — you’re now ready to use rsync on AlmaLinux for fast, reliable file transfers.