Measure the Duration of a Command

1. Problem

You want to know how long a command takes to execute.

2. Solution

To measure the duration of a command, use the Measure-Command cmdlet:

        PS >Measure-Command { Start-Sleep -Milliseconds 337 }

        Days              : 0

        Hours             : 0

        Minutes           : 0

        Seconds           : 0

        Milliseconds      : 339

        Ticks             : 3392297

        TotalDays         : 3.92626967592593E-06

        TotalHours        : 9.42304722222222E-05

        TotalMinutes      : 0.00565382833333333

        TotalSeconds      : 0.3392297

        TotalMilliseconds : 339.2297

3. Discussion

In interactive use, it is common to want to measure the duration of a command. An example of this might be running a performance benchmark on an application you’ve developed. The Measure-Command cmdlet makes this easy to do. Because the command generates rich object-based output, you can use its output for many date-related tasks. See Section 3.4, “Work with .NET Objects,” for more information.

For more information about the Measure-Command cmdlet, type Get-Help Measure-Command.