Solve the AzCopy 404 download error on Linux. Official Microsoft URL fails with version 10.31.0 not found. Working fix using direct GitHub release v10.30.1 f...
Why the Official Download Link Fails
AzCopy is Microsoft’s command-line tool for bulk transfers to and from Azure Storage. On Linux, many install guides still point at the short link aka.ms/downloadazcopy-v10-linux. That redirect is convenient when it works: one URL, always “latest.” When it breaks, you get a plain 404 instead of a tarball.
The failure mode is simple. The short link currently resolves toward version 10.31.0, and that artifact is not where the client expects it—or is not published at all. Your shell reports “not found,” curl exits non-zero, and any script that assumed the official URL would always work stops cold. The problem is not your network or permissions; the published path for that version is missing.
Use a Direct GitHub Release Instead
When the aka.ms redirect is wrong, skip it. AzCopy publishes Linux builds as release assets on GitHub. A working approach is to download the known-good v10.30.1 Linux package from the project’s releases page, not from the short link. That gives you a fixed URL and a fixed binary checksum path you can pin in automation.
Typical steps:
- Open the AzCopy releases list on GitHub and open the v10.30.1 release.
- Download the Linux tarball asset for your architecture (x86_64 or ARM as appropriate).
- Extract the archive, mark the
azcopybinary executable, and move it onto yourPATH(for example under/usr/local/bin). - Run
azcopy --versionand confirm it reports v10.30.1 before you rely on it in scripts.
If you install from a CI job, prefer a direct asset URL from that release over any redirect that might change without notice. Pinning the version avoids the next “latest” redirect pointing at another missing build.
Why Pinning Beats “Always Latest”
Short links like aka.ms are fine for interactive installs when the backend is healthy. They are fragile for unattended pipelines: the redirect target can move ahead of a published asset, or a single bad release metadata update can 404 every machine that trusts the short URL. A direct release download trades “always newest” for “always resolvable.”
For production and shared images, that tradeoff is usually correct. You control when you upgrade, you can test one known binary, and a broken redirect does not block storage jobs. When Microsoft restores a working latest link or publishes a complete 10.31.0 (or newer) Linux package, you can re-evaluate—but you do not have to wait on that to keep transferring data.
Practical Safeguards After Install
After you place the binary, keep the install deterministic. Document the exact release version (v10.30.1), the asset name you used, and how you verified the download (checksum if the release provides one, or at least a successful azcopy --version). In scripts, fail fast on HTTP errors from the download step so a 404 never silently becomes a half-installed tool.
If you still prefer a one-liner for humans, wrap the GitHub asset URL in your own internal mirror or package, not the public aka.ms redirect. That way a future 404 on the official short link remains an annoyance for browsers, not an outage for your Linux hosts. Until the official path to 10.31.0 is fixed, treat the GitHub v10.30.1 release as the reliable install source.