How to uninstall Apps in Ubuntu 20.04

ubuntu20.jpeg

Sometimes removing an application on a linux machine can be a tedious process. In a nutshell, there are two ways of uninstalling an application: One way is by making use of terminal or with Ubuntu Software Center. In this article, I wanted to talk about the harder part, uninstalling the software using the terminal. The first way: Open up your terminal using a shortcut Ctrl+Alt+T on your keyboard

sudo apt-get remove <application_name>

Note that it might ask for your password as it needs a administrator access. This kind of uninstallation will remove the binaries but not the configuration or data files of the package applicationname. It will also leave dependencies installed with it on installation time untouched.

The other way of uninstalling apps might by leveraging remove and purge commands.

sudo apt-get remove --auto-remove <application_name>
sudo apt-get purge --auto-remove <application_name>

This command removes everything inside the given package, but not the dependencies installed with it on installation. The --auto-remove option (being an alias of autoremove) works similar to sudo apt-get autoremove.

Conclusion

You've learnt the two ways to uninstall a package. Hope this was helpful. If you face any problem or any feedback, please leave a comment below.