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⇱ Linux 6.15 exFAT Can Delete Files Much Faster: 4+ Minutes To 1.6 Second Optimization - Phoronix


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Linux 6.15 exFAT Can Delete Files Much Faster: 4+ Minutes To 1.6 Second Optimization

Written by Michael Larabel in Linux Storage on 31 March 2025 at 10:23 AM EDT. 20 Comments
For those dealing with exFAT formatted storage devices under Linux, the upcoming Linux 6.15 kernel has a big optimization for yielding much faster delete performance when making use of the "discard" mount option.

The exFAT file-system updates were sent out today for the kernel driver with Linux 6.15. There are some small fixes and optimizations to this exFAT driver but most striking is the improvement to delete performance when leveraging the discard mount option.

Yuezhang Mo of Sony made the improvement to support batch discard of clusters when freeing clusters. Mo explained in that patch:
"If the discard mount option is enabled, the file's clusters are discarded when the clusters are freed. Discarding clusters one by one will significantly reduce performance. Poor performance may cause soft lockup when lots of clusters are freed.

This commit improves performance by discarding contiguous clusters in batches."

For deleting an 80G test file, on prior kernels atop an exFAT file-system it took 286 seconds while with this patch for Linux 6.15 it drops down to 1.6 seconds! It's quite an improvement for those using exFAT file-systems with the discard mount option:

👁 exFAT faster delete


The exFAT patches for Linux 6.15 can be found via this pull request.

Michael Larabel is the principal author of Phoronix.com and founded the site in 2004 with a focus on enriching the Linux hardware experience. Michael has written more than 20,000 articles covering the state of Linux hardware support, Linux performance, graphics drivers, and other topics. Michael is also the lead developer of the Phoronix Test Suite, Phoromatic, and OpenBenchmarking.org automated benchmarking software. He can be followed via Twitter, LinkedIn, or contacted via MichaelLarabel.com.