# Torrent

A .torrent file is a file that BitTorrent and other peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing programs use to download content, such as videos, music, games, or documents, over the Internet. It contains metadata that describes the to-be-downloaded content and tells BitTorrent where to download the content from. For example, .torrent files specify the name, file size, and folder structure of to-be-downloaded content.

Before you make a torrent, there are a few things to keep in mind:

Newer clients and tools allow you to make three types of .torrent files which are v1, Hybrid and v2. Always use v1 when making torrents because none of the public or private trackers currently support Hybrid or v2 as these are relatively new.
Do not make a torrent of a directory containing a single file, instead make a torrent of the file itself.
When making a torrent file, you'll have to select a "piece" size in which your data is sliced up so you can get small amounts of verifiable data from several peers at a time.
Too small pieces make for more protocol overhead, bigger torrent files, longer hashing times and possibly higher load on the CPU and HDD.
Too large pieces can slow down piece distribution.
Older torrent clients do not support 16MiB+ piece sizes. When using 16MiB pieces, torrent size limits are only a concern above ~5TB.
Most clients automatically pick too small piece sizes, except dottorrent-gui which aims for a reasonable 1000-1500 pieces.
You can target ~1000 pieces with 16MiB being the upper limit. Here's a reference:

to 4GB - 4MiB
to 8GB  - 8MiB
to ∞ GB - 16MiB

# Public Tracker URLs

http://nyaa.tracker.wf:7777/announce

http://anidex.moe:6969/announce

udp://open.stealth.si:80/announce

udp://tracker.opentrackr.org:1337/announce

udp://exodus.desync.com:6969/announce

udp://tracker.torrent.eu.org:451/announce

There are several ways to make a torrent:

torf-cli - Cross Platform, CLI.
torrenttools - Cross Platform, CLI.
mktorrent - Linux only, CLI.
dottorrent-gui - Windows, GUI.
Qbittorrent - Cross Platform, GUI, Slowest of the bunch.

# torf-cli

Refer to the torf-cli docs for advanced features like Profiles.

Command to make a torrent of a single file or directory

torf --max-piece-size 16 ^
-t http://nyaa.tracker.wf:7777/announce,^
http://anidex.moe:6969/announce,^
udp://open.stealth.si:80/announce,^
udp://tracker.opentrackr.org:1337/announce,^
udp://tracker.coppersurfer.tk:6969/announce,^
udp://exodus.desync.com:6969/announce ^
"D:\path\to\root\directory"

torf --max-piece-size 16 \
-t http://nyaa.tracker.wf:7777/announce \
http://anidex.moe:6969/announce,\
udp://open.stealth.si:80/announce,\
udp://tracker.opentrackr.org:1337/announce,\
udp://tracker.coppersurfer.tk:6969/announce,\
udp://exodus.desync.com:6969/announce \
"New Folder"

Command to make a torrent for each subdirectory

for /d %X in (*) do torf --max-piece-size 16 ^
-t http://nyaa.tracker.wf:7777/announce,^
http://anidex.moe:6969/announce,^
udp://open.stealth.si:80/announce,^
udp://tracker.opentrackr.org:1337/announce,^
udp://tracker.coppersurfer.tk:6969/announce,^
udp://exodus.desync.com:6969/announce ^
"%X"

for dir in ./*/; do torf --max-piece-size 16 \
-t http://nyaa.tracker.wf:7777/announce,\
http://anidex.moe:6969/announce,\
udp://open.stealth.si:80/announce,\
udp://tracker.opentrackr.org:1337/announce,\
udp://tracker.coppersurfer.tk:6969/announce,\
udp://exodus.desync.com:6969/announce \
"$dir"; done

Command to make a torrent for each file in a directory

for %X in (*.mkv) do torf --max-piece-size 16 ^
-t http://nyaa.tracker.wf:7777/announce,^
http://anidex.moe:6969/announce,^
udp://open.stealth.si:80/announce,^
udp://tracker.opentrackr.org:1337/announce,^
udp://tracker.coppersurfer.tk:6969/announce,^
udp://exodus.desync.com:6969/announce ^
"%X"

for file in *.mkv; do torf --max-piece-size 16 \
-t http://nyaa.tracker.wf:7777/announce,\
http://anidex.moe:6969/announce,\
udp://open.stealth.si:80/announce,\
udp://tracker.opentrackr.org:1337/announce,\
udp://tracker.coppersurfer.tk:6969/announce,\
udp://exodus.desync.com:6969/announce \
"$file"; done

# torrenttools

Refer to the torrenttools docs for advanced features like Named trackers and Tracker groups.

Command to make a torrent of a single file or directory

torrenttools create -l 16MiB ^
-a http://nyaa.tracker.wf:7777/announce ^
http://anidex.moe:6969/announce ^
udp://open.stealth.si:80/announce ^
udp://tracker.opentrackr.org:1337/announce ^
udp://tracker.coppersurfer.tk:6969/announce ^
udp://exodus.desync.com:6969/announce ^
"D:\path\to\root\directory"

torrenttools create -l 16MiB \
-a http://nyaa.tracker.wf:7777/announce \
http://anidex.moe:6969/announce \
udp://open.stealth.si:80/announce \
udp://tracker.opentrackr.org:1337/announce \
udp://tracker.coppersurfer.tk:6969/announce \
udp://exodus.desync.com:6969/announce \
"New Folder"

Command to make a torrent for each subdirectory

for /d %X in (*) do torrenttools create -l 16MiB ^
-a http://nyaa.tracker.wf:7777/announce ^
http://anidex.moe:6969/announce ^
udp://open.stealth.si:80/announce ^
udp://tracker.opentrackr.org:1337/announce ^
udp://tracker.coppersurfer.tk:6969/announce ^
udp://exodus.desync.com:6969/announce ^
"%X"

for dir in ./*/; do torrenttools create -l 16MiB \
-a http://nyaa.tracker.wf:7777/announce \
http://anidex.moe:6969/announce \
udp://open.stealth.si:80/announce \
udp://tracker.opentrackr.org:1337/announce \
udp://tracker.coppersurfer.tk:6969/announce \
udp://exodus.desync.com:6969/announce \
"$dir"; done

Command to make a torrent for each file in a directory

for %X in (*.mkv) do torrenttools create -l 16MiB ^
-a http://nyaa.tracker.wf:7777/announce ^
http://anidex.moe:6969/announce ^
udp://open.stealth.si:80/announce ^
udp://tracker.opentrackr.org:1337/announce ^
udp://tracker.coppersurfer.tk:6969/announce ^
udp://exodus.desync.com:6969/announce ^
"%X"

for file in *.mkv; do torrenttools create -l 16MiB \
-a http://nyaa.tracker.wf:7777/announce \
http://anidex.moe:6969/announce \
udp://open.stealth.si:80/announce \
udp://tracker.opentrackr.org:1337/announce \
udp://tracker.coppersurfer.tk:6969/announce \
udp://exodus.desync.com:6969/announce \
"$file"; done

# mktorrent

For mktorrent, piece size is passed as -l n where n is the power of 2, making the piece size equal to 2^(n) bytes.

n = 22 -> 4MiB
n = 23 -> 8MiB
n = 24 -> 16MiB

Command to make a torrent of a single file or directory

mktorrent -v -l 24 \
-a http://nyaa.tracker.wf:7777/announce \
-a http://anidex.moe:6969/announce \
-a udp://open.stealth.si:80/announce \
-a udp://tracker.opentrackr.org:1337/announce \
-a udp://tracker.coppersurfer.tk:6969/announce \
-a udp://exodus.desync.com:6969/announce \
"D:\path\to\root\directory"

Command to make a torrent for each subdirectory

for dir in ./*/; do mktorrent -v -l 24 \
-a http://nyaa.tracker.wf:7777/announce \
-a http://anidex.moe:6969/announce \
-a udp://open.stealth.si:80/announce \
-a udp://tracker.opentrackr.org:1337/announce \
-a udp://tracker.coppersurfer.tk:6969/announce \
-a udp://exodus.desync.com:6969/announce \
"$dir"; done

Command to make a torrent for each file in a directory

for file in *.mkv; do mktorrent -v -l 24 \
-a http://nyaa.tracker.wf:7777/announce \
-a http://anidex.moe:6969/announce \
-a udp://open.stealth.si:80/announce \
-a udp://tracker.opentrackr.org:1337/announce \
-a udp://tracker.coppersurfer.tk:6969/announce \
-a udp://exodus.desync.com:6969/announce \
"$file"; done

# dottorrent-gui

# qbittorrent

Line breaks after each tracker URL are necessary when creating a torrent with Qbittorrent.