Removing Conda environment

Question

I want to remove a certain environment created with conda. How can I achieve that? Let's say I have an active testenv environment. I tried, by following documentation, with:

$ conda env remove

CondaEnvironmentError: cannot remove current environment. deactivate and run conda remove again

I then deactivate it:

$ source deactivate

I try running again the command to remove it and I still get the same error. What is going wrong here?

Make sure you're running the terminal as an administrator otherwise commands will run successfully without throwing any error but env will not be removed. — Krishna, Jan 26 '19 at 08:21

score 1130 · Answer 1 · edited May 11 '23 at 15:27

1130

You probably didn't fully deactivate the Conda environment - remember, the command you need to use with Conda is conda deactivate (for older versions, use source deactivate). So it may be wise to start a new shell and activate the environment in that before you try. Then deactivate it.

You can use the command

conda remove -n ENV_NAME --all

to remove the environment with that name. (--name is equivalent to -n)

Note that you can also place environments anywhere you want using -p /path/to/env instead of -n ENV_NAME when both creating and deleting environments, if you choose. They don't have to live in your conda installation.

UPDATE, 30 Jan 2019: From Conda 4.6 onwards the conda activate command becomes the new official way to activate an environment across all platforms. The changes are described in this Anaconda blog post

UPDATE, 24 Feb 2023: The conda env subcommand has been deprecated. Now, the officially recommended way is conda remove -n ENV_NAME --all. You can update to the latest version with conda install -n base -c defaults conda (sometimes it helps to specify the new version with eg ... -c defaults conda=23.3.1).

edited May 11 '23 at 15:27

Roelant

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answered Mar 06 '18 at 10:00

holdenweb

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You're right, my mistake when writing the post. I meant `source deactivate`. Thank you – renatodamas Mar 06 '18 at 10:04
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Actually you can use `conda deactivate` as well and it works likewise. At least in the version 4.4.11 – renatodamas Mar 06 '18 at 10:11
Thanks. But not just `deactivate` on its own, right? – holdenweb Mar 08 '18 at 07:27
Yes, either `source deactivate` or `conda deactivate` – renatodamas Mar 08 '18 at 09:25
`EnvironmentLocationNotFound: Not a conda environment: /home/user/.conda/envs/ENVIRONMENT ` – user924 Mar 29 '19 at 07:43
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Do yourself a favor and run this after you use `conda env remove`: `rm -rf ~/anaconda/envs/ENV_NAME` if you use the default anaconda install location. – rjurney Apr 17 '19 at 18:25
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If deleting an environment leaves anything behind I'd imagine that the Anaconda team would appreciate a bug report. – holdenweb Apr 18 '19 at 16:07
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also if you create a prefix it will work: conda env remove -p << prefix path >> – Cornea Valentin Jun 05 '19 at 08:39
What I did before was that I just removed the folder containing the virtual environment. Is it bad to the system integrity? – Wei Shan Lee Mar 04 '22 at 07:06
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It's unlikely you'd mess anything up by removing the folder, but I'm a big fan of using recommended methods just in case anything changes. – holdenweb Mar 04 '22 at 14:09
why not describe in this answer what --all does? – PascalIv Mar 04 '23 at 15:36
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If you're like me and remove conda environments to create space on the disk, remember to do a conda clean to delete cached packages after removing the environment, e.g. `conda clean -a` Read more here before doing it https://docs.conda.io/projects/conda/en/latest/commands/clean.html – tu_curious Jun 14 '23 at 22:27

score 266 · Answer 2 · edited Feb 24 '23 at 18:41

266

After making sure your environment is not active, type:

$ conda remove --name ENVIRONMENT --all

edited Feb 24 '23 at 18:41

Cornelius Roemer

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answered Mar 06 '18 at 09:56

renatodamas

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This is the information I needed. Would have been nice if `conda env --help` had given it. – R. Schreurs Mar 22 '19 at 09:51
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`EnvironmentLocationNotFound: Not a conda environment: /home/user/.conda/envs/ENVIRONMENT ` – user924 Mar 29 '19 at 07:43
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I submitted a bug about failures to update the help text, and it was marked as an easy issue for beginners, so there's hope of a fix. – holdenweb Apr 29 '19 at 11:58
What is the conda version that brought this command into existence? It din't work on conda 4.14.0 . – qqqqq Mar 23 '23 at 17:14

score 96 · Answer 3 · answered May 26 '19 at 08:01

Official documentation way worked for me:

conda remove --name myenv --all

Or just conda env remove --name myenv.

To verify that the environment was removed, in your terminal window or an Anaconda Prompt, run:

conda info --envs

The environments list that displays should not show the removed environment.

You anaconda3 enviroments folder might list an empty folder of deleted environment in your anaconda3 installation folder, like:

/opt/anaconda3/envs

What is the --all flag doing exactly? I couldn't find any docs for this — Johannes Wiesner, Nov 02 '22 at 11:00

score 65 · Answer 4 · edited Mar 12 '22 at 08:32

65

If you are in base:

(base) HP-Compaq-Elite-8300-CMT:~$

remove env_name by:

conda env remove -n env_name

if you are already in env_name environment :

(env_name) HP-Compaq-Elite-8300-CMT:~$

deactivate then remove by :

conda deactivate
conda env remove -n env_name

edited Mar 12 '22 at 08:32

Innat

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answered Jan 10 '20 at 08:59

Shilpa Shinde

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score 51 · Answer 5 · answered Jan 30 '21 at 05:10

51

In my windows 10 Enterprise edition os this code works fine: (suppose for environment namely testenv)

conda env remove --name testenv

answered Jan 30 '21 at 05:10

dipakbera

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Chris Keefe · Answer 6 · 2019-05-17T17:54:26.233

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Environments created with the --prefix or -p flag must be removed with the -p flag (not -n).

For example: conda remove -p </filepath/myenvironment> --all, in which </filepath/myenvironment> is substituted with a complete or relative path to the environment.

edited May 17 '19 at 17:54

answered May 13 '19 at 22:11

Chris Keefe

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Simba · Answer 7 · 2019-09-30T11:40:43.930

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There're 3 ways to achieve this in total. Assuming you have a environment named myenv,

conda env remove --name myenv, -n is shortcut for --name.
conda remove --name myenv --all.

Delete the env folder directly. (Not recommended)

# list environments and their locations
conda env list
# or
# conda info --envs

# delete the folder listed
rm -rf /Users/username/.local/share/conda/envs/myenv

If you wanna delete the environment without a prompt to let you check again. Use -y, shortcut for --yes. (For global use check silent prompt in conda)

conda env remove -n myenv -y
conda remove -n myenv --all -y

References

conda env --help
conda remove --help

edited Sep 30 '19 at 11:40

answered Sep 28 '19 at 15:40

Simba

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And why is deleting the env folder directly not recommended? What could possibly go wrong? – NoName Jun 13 '20 at 15:57
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@NoName Conda provides packages with a hookable pre-unlink event fired prior to package removal. Deleting directly would skip this. AFAICT, it's rarely used and mostly manages things internal to the env (e.g., a Jupyter *extension* will de-register itself with the Jupyter instance through such hooks), so deleting everything shouldn't break stuff. However, [searching turns up some packages](https://github.com/search?q=org%3Aconda-forge+unlink&type=code) (e.g., FSL-related packages) that appear to register externally, in which case manual deletion might leave dangling references. – merv Aug 06 '21 at 05:03

dilip_nikhil · Answer 8 · 2022-06-01T05:36:28.113

31

First deactivate the environment that you wish to remove.
Then type the following code:

conda env remove -n <your environment name>
To make sure you have deleted it, you can use the following code.

conda info --envs or conda env list

4.If you wan to remove all the dependencies along with the installed packages, you can use:

conda remove -n <environment name> --all

edited Jun 01 '22 at 05:36

answered Jun 01 '22 at 05:29

dilip_nikhil

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What is environment name and where i get it from please dont post half of the information. Your question should be complete – Haseeb Mir Feb 12 '23 at 14:22

score 19 · Answer 9 · edited Jan 29 '20 at 13:53

19

You may try the following: Open anaconda command prompt and type

conda remove --name myenv --all

This will remove the entire environment.

Further reading: docs.conda.io > Manage Environments

edited Jan 29 '20 at 13:53

B--rian

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answered Jan 29 '20 at 13:43

Muhamad Mohsin

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score 17 · Answer 10 · edited Oct 28 '20 at 01:56

17

To remove complete conda environment :

conda remove --name YOUR_CONDA_ENV_NAME --all

edited Oct 28 '20 at 01:56

0x90

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answered May 18 '20 at 12:34

Bhadru Bhukya

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score 16 · Answer 11 · answered Feb 12 '19 at 07:00

First you have to deactivate your environment before removing it. You can remove conda environment by using the following command

Suppose your environment name is "sample_env" , you can remove this environment by using

source deactivate    
conda remove -n sample_env --all

'--all' will be used to remove all the dependencies

score 15 · Answer 12 · edited Jul 13 '18 at 19:26

15

My environment name is: test

conda remove -n test --all

edited Jul 13 '18 at 19:26

francescalus

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answered Jul 13 '18 at 19:13

CodeUrLife

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score 11 · Answer 13 · answered Jan 09 '23 at 05:41

11

First I checkout from the environment (tensorflow):

conda deactivate

Then I removed the environment by:

conda remove -n tensorflow --all

The tensorflow is the name of my environment

You can check your env name using this command:

conda env list

answered Jan 09 '23 at 05:41

Ashok Chhetri

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score 10 · Answer 14 · edited Jan 07 '19 at 16:15

10

Use source deactivate to deactivate the environment before removing it, replace ENV_NAME with the environment you wish to remove:

source deactivate
conda env remove -n ENV_NAME

edited Jan 07 '19 at 16:15

ntg

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answered Nov 10 '18 at 14:49

Jason

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An explanation, what a code does and how this addresses the problem in the question, rarely fails to improve an answer. – MBT Nov 10 '18 at 16:02
`EnvironmentLocationNotFound: Not a conda environment: /home/user/.conda/envs/ENV_NAME` – user924 Mar 29 '19 at 07:44

score 6 · Answer 15 · edited Apr 02 '19 at 14:49

6

First deactivate the environment and come back to the base environment. From the base, you should be able to run the command conda env remove -n <envname>. This will give you the message

Remove all packages in environment C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\Continuum\anaconda3\envs\{envname}:

edited Apr 02 '19 at 14:49

CAPSLOCK

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answered Apr 02 '19 at 14:01

Deepak

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score 5 · Answer 16 · edited Mar 18 '20 at 16:42

5

This worked for me:

conda env remove --name tensorflow

edited Mar 18 '20 at 16:42

Bart

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answered Mar 18 '20 at 14:32

Arman Samimi

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Worked for me too. ```conda env remove --name ``` Later you can delete the environment folder from Anaconda or miniconda install location ```Anaconda\envs\``` or ```Miniconda\envs\``` – Giriraj Pawar Apr 22 '20 at 07:24

Vineet Singh · Answer 17 · 2022-01-03T05:34:15.907

View the environments in Anaconda or miniconda:

conda env list

If you have created an environment using name then use:

conda remove -n envname --all

if you have created an environment using prefix then use:

conda remove -p [path] --all

Change the envname with your environment name and in case of prefix provide the complete path of the environment eg: C:/Users/techv/Desktop/project/env.
--all will remove all the dependencies of the target environment.

I hope this answer will be helpful.

score 4 · Answer 18 · answered Oct 14 '21 at 09:50

4

if you are unfamiliar with the command line , you can remove it using the anaconda dashboard

answered Oct 14 '21 at 09:50

Mohamed TOUATI

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score -2 · Answer 19 · answered Mar 31 '20 at 13:23

-2

Because you can only deactivate the active environment, so conda deactivate does not need nor accept arguments. The error message is very explicit here.

Just call conda deactivate https://github.com/conda/conda/issues/7296#issuecomment-389504269

answered Mar 31 '20 at 13:23

Jaffer Al-Delphi

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score -6 · Answer 20 · answered Apr 13 '21 at 12:19

-6

on terminal it's showing

(base) [root@localhost ~]#

simply hit command : conda deactivate

and you are out of conda env , now your prompt will look like

[root@localhost ~]#

answered Apr 13 '21 at 12:19

Nishant Singh

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The answer does not provide any new insights. It was already mentioned to run this command as root. – Wör Du Schnaffzig Apr 13 '21 at 12:48

Removing Conda environment

20 Answers20

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