<p><code>age</code> encrypts or decrypts <var>INPUT</var> to <var>OUTPUT</var>. The <var>INPUT</var> argument is
optional and defaults to standard input. Only a single <var>INPUT</var> file may be
specified. If <code>-o</code> is not specified, <var>OUTPUT</var> defaults to standard output.</p>
<p>If <code>--passphrase</code> is specified, the file is encrypted with a passphrase
requested interactively. Otherwise, it's encrypted to one or more
<ahref="#RECIPIENTS-AND-IDENTITIES"title="RECIPIENTS AND IDENTITIES"data-bare-link="true">RECIPIENTS</a> specified with <code>-r</code>/<code>--recipient</code> or
<code>-R</code>/<code>--recipients-file</code>. Every recipient can decrypt the file.</p>
<p>In <code>--decrypt</code> mode, passphrase-encrypted files are detected automatically and
the passphrase is requested interactively. Otherwise, one or more
<ahref="#RECIPIENTS-AND-IDENTITIES"title="RECIPIENTS AND IDENTITIES"data-bare-link="true">IDENTITIES</a> specified with <code>-i</code>/<code>--identity</code> are
used to decrypt the file.</p>
<p><code>age</code> encrypted files are binary and not malleable, with around 200 bytes of
overhead per recipient, plus 16 bytes every 64KiB of plaintext.</p>
<h2id="OPTIONS">OPTIONS</h2>
<dl>
<dt><code>-o</code>, <code>--output</code>=<var>OUTPUT</var></dt><dd><p> Write encrypted or decrypted file to <var>OUTPUT</var> instead of standard output.
If <var>OUTPUT</var> already exists it will be overwritten.</p>
<p> If encrypting without <code>--armor</code>, <code>age</code> will refuse to output binary to a
TTY. This can be forced by specifying <code>-</code> as <var>OUTPUT</var>.</p></dd>
<dt><code>--version</code></dt><dd><p> Print the version and exit.</p></dd>
<dt><code>-e</code>, <code>--encrypt</code></dt><dd><p> Encrypt <var>INPUT</var> to <var>OUTPUT</var>. This is the default.</p></dd>
<dt><code>-r</code>, <code>--recipient</code>=<var>RECIPIENT</var></dt><dd><p> Encrypt to the explicitly specified <var>RECIPIENT</var>. See the
<ahref="#RECIPIENTS-AND-IDENTITIES"title="RECIPIENTS AND IDENTITIES"data-bare-link="true">RECIPIENTS AND IDENTITIES</a> section for possible recipient formats.</p>
<p> This option can be repeated and combined with <code>-R</code>/<code>--recipients-file</code>,
and the file can be decrypted by all provided recipients independently.</p></dd>
<dt><code>-R</code>, <code>--recipients-file</code>=<var>PATH</var></dt><dd><p> Encrypt to the <ahref="#RECIPIENTS-AND-IDENTITIES"title="RECIPIENTS AND IDENTITIES"data-bare-link="true">RECIPIENTS</a> listed in the
file at <var>PATH</var>, one per line. Empty lines and lines starting with <code>#</code>
are ignored as comments.</p>
<p> If <var>PATH</var> is <code>-</code>, the recipients are read from standard input. In
this case, the <var>INPUT</var> argument must be specified.</p>
<p> This option can be repeated and combined with <code>-r</code>/<code>--recipient</code>,
and the file can be decrypted by all provided recipients independently.</p></dd>
<dt><code>-p</code>, <code>--passphrase</code></dt><dd><p> Encrypt with a passphrase, requested interactively from the terminal.
<code>age</code> will offer to auto-generate a secure passphrase.</p>
<p> This options can't be used with <code>-r</code>/<code>--recipient</code> or
<dt><code>-d</code>, <code>--decrypt</code></dt><dd><p> Decrypt <var>INPUT</var> to <var>OUTPUT</var>.</p>
<p> If <var>INPUT</var> is passphrase encrypted, it will be automatically detected
and the passphrase will be requested interactively. Otherwise, the
<ahref="#RECIPIENTS-AND-IDENTITIES"title="RECIPIENTS AND IDENTITIES"data-bare-link="true">IDENTITIES</a> specified with <code>-i</code>/<code>--identity</code>
are used.</p>
<p> ASCII armoring is transparently detected and decoded.</p></dd>
<dt><code>-i</code>, <code>--identity</code>=<var>PATH</var></dt><dd><p> Decrypt using the <ahref="#RECIPIENTS-AND-IDENTITIES"title="RECIPIENTS AND IDENTITIES"data-bare-link="true">IDENTITIES</a> at <var>PATH</var>.</p>
<p><var>PATH</var> may be one of the following:</p>
<p> a. A file listing <ahref="#RECIPIENTS-AND-IDENTITIES"title="RECIPIENTS AND IDENTITIES"data-bare-link="true">IDENTITIES</a> one per line.
Empty lines and lines starting with "<code>#</code>" are ignored as comments.</p>
<p>Native <code>age</code> key pairs are generated with <aclass="man-ref"href="age-keygen.1.html">age-keygen<spanclass="s">(1)</span></a>, and provide small
encodings and strong encryption based on X25519. They are the recommended
recipient type for most applications.</p>
<p>A <code>RECIPIENT</code> encoding begins with <code>age1</code> and looks like the following:</p>