可使用 readelf 公用程式來讀取二進位的內容。甚至可將它用在為其它硬體架構而建立的 ELF 檔案：

$ readelf --file-header /bin/ls
ELF Header:
  Magic:   7f 45 4c 46 01 01 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 
  Class:                             ELF32
  Data:                              2's complement, little endian
  Version:                           1 (current)
  OS/ABI:                            UNIX - System V
  ABI Version:                       0
  Type:                              EXEC (Executable file)
  Machine:                           Intel 80386
  Version:                           0x1
  Entry point address:               0x8049b40
  Start of program headers:          52 (bytes into file)
  Start of section headers:          76192 (bytes into file)
  Flags:                             0x0
  Size of this header:               52 (bytes)
  Size of program headers:           32 (bytes)
  Number of program headers:         9
  Size of section headers:           40 (bytes)
  Number of section headers:         29
  Section header string table index: 26