# Name `nix-store --export` - export store paths to a Nix Archive ## Synopsis `nix-store` `--export` *paths…* ## Description The operation `--export` writes a serialisation of the specified store paths to standard output in a format that can be imported into another Nix store with `nix-store --import`. This is like `nix-store --dump`, except that the NAR archive produced by that command doesn’t contain the necessary meta-information to allow it to be imported into another Nix store (namely, the set of references of the path). This command does not produce a *closure* of the specified paths, so if a store path references other store paths that are missing in the target Nix store, the import will fail. {{#include ./opt-common.md}} {{#include ../opt-common.md}} {{#include ../env-common.md}} # Examples To copy a whole closure, do something like: ```console $ nix-store --export $(nix-store --query --requisites paths) > out ``` To import the whole closure again, run: ```console $ nix-store --import < out ```