How to Download RPM Packages with Dependencies Using dnf

Updated: 28 September 2026 · Applies to: dnf 4.14 to 4.20 with dnf-plugins-core on AlmaLinux and Rocky Linux 9 and 10 and RHEL 9 and 10; dnf5 on Fedora

Sometimes you need RPM packages as files instead of installing them: to install them on a server without internet access, to keep exact versions, or to inspect them first. On CentOS 7 and older releases this needed the yum-downloadonly plugin or yumdownloader and repotrack from yum-utils. Today the same jobs are built into dnf; the yum-utils package still provides yumdownloader and repotrack as wrappers for old scripts. We tested the commands below on AlmaLinux 9 and 10.

Before you start

The download command comes from the dnf-plugins-core package, which is usually installed. If not: dnf install dnf-plugins-core.

Method 1: download a package and its missing dependencies

mkdir -p /root/rpms && cd /root/rpms
dnf download --resolve nano

--resolve adds the dependencies that are not installed on this server. If the target server has the same packages installed as this one, this is all you need.

Method 2: download the package with every dependency

dnf download --resolve --alldeps nano

--alldeps also downloads dependencies that are already installed here. Use this for an offline server whose installed packages you do not know. For nano this is 18 files on a minimal AlmaLinux 9 system, instead of 1.

Method 3: download as if installing

dnf install --downloadonly --downloaddir=/root/rpms nano

dnf works out exactly what an install would need on this server and saves those packages without installing them.

Other useful options

• A specific version: dnf download nano-5.6.1-7.el9
• The source package: dnf download --source nano
• Only print the download addresses: dnf download --url nano
• For another architecture: dnf download --arch=x86_64 nano

See the dependencies first

dnf repoquery --requires --resolve nano

More ways to explore dependencies are in how to use repoquery.

Install the downloaded files on the other server

dnf install /root/rpms/*.rpm

Installing through dnf, rather than rpm -i, checks signatures and installs everything in the right order. On a server without internet access, add --disablerepo='*' so dnf does not try to reach repositories.

Official documentation: DNF download plugin.