How to delete a temporary file in Java?

The class named File of the java.io package represents a file or directory (path names) in the system. This class provides various methods to perform various operations on files/directories.

Temporary files

In certain scenarios such as unit testing, or for some application logics you might need to create temporary files.

The File class in Java provides a method with name createTempFile(). This method accepts two String variables representing the prefix (starting name) and suffix(extension) of the temp file and a File object representing the directory (abstract path) at which you need to create the file.

Example

Following Java example creates a temporary file named exampleTempFile5387153267019244721.txt in the path D:/SampleDirectory

import java.io.File;
import java.io.IOException;
public class TempararyFiles {
   public static void main(String args[]) throws IOException {
      String prefix = "exampleTempFile";
      String suffix = ".txt";
      //Creating a File object for directory
      File directoryPath = new File("D:/SampleDirectory");
      //Creating a temp file
      File.createTempFile(prefix, suffix, directoryPath);
      System.out.println("Temp file created.........");
   }
}

Output

Temp file created.........

Deleting the temporary file

You can delete a temporary file in two ways using the File class and, using the Files class.

Using File class

The File class provides a delete() method which deletes the current file or directory, invoke this method on the temporary file.

Example

The following Java program creates and deletes a temp file.

import java.io.File;
import java.io.IOException;
public class TempararyFiles {
   public static void main(String args[]) throws IOException {
      String prefix = "exampleTempFile";
      String suffix = ".txt";
      //Creating a File object for directory
      File directoryPath = new File("D:/SampleDirectory");
      //Creating a temp file
      File tempFile = File.createTempFile(prefix, suffix, directoryPath);
      System.out.println("Temp file created: "+tempFile.getAbsolutePath());
      //Deleting the file
      tempFile.delete();
      System.out.println("Temp file deleted.........");
   }
}

Output

Temp file created: D:\SampleDirectory\exampleTempFile7179732984227266899.txt
Temp file deleted.........

Using the Files class

Just like the file class the Files class of java.nio package provides createTempFile() method which accepts two String parameters representing the prefix and suffix of and creates a temp file with specified details.

The delete() method of this class accepts a path object and deletes the file in the specified path.

Example

Following Java program creates and deletes a temporary file using the using the Files class.

import java.io.File;
import java.io.IOException;
import java.nio.file.Files;
import java.nio.file.Path;
public class TempararyFiles {
   public static void main(String args[]) throws IOException {
      String prefix = "exampleTempFile";
      String suffix = ".txt";
      //Creating a File object for directory
      File directoryPath = new File("D:/SampleDirectory");
      //Creating a temp file
      Path tempFilePath = Files.createTempFile(prefix, suffix);
      System.out.println("Temp file created: "+tempFilePath.toString());
      //Deleting the file
      Files.deleteIfExists(tempFilePath);
      System.out.println("Temp file deleted.........");
   }
}

Output

Temp file created: C:\Users\TUTORI~2\AppData\Local\Temp\exampleTempFile1192122004600989866.txt
Temp file deleted.........