Is is possible to modify the maven console output to hide the [INFO] logging?

I don't think there is a way to configure it as a logger but mvn -q hides the [INFO] lines and mvn -X shows the debug messages.

Update in 2015: newer versions of maven have added a config file where this is finally possible although as a global per install configuration, check on your $mavenInstallationDir/conf/logging/simplelogger.properties if the file doesn't exist then your maven version is probably too old, I believe it was added on the 3.1 release

try grepping the output, e.g. mvn help:evaluate -Dexpression=project.version | grep -v "^\["

You can activate debug output using -X or --debug. For example:

mvn -X install

You can hide INFO messages using -q or --quiet. For example:

mvn -q install

From their own docs, you want this:

RESULT=$(mvn help:evaluate -Dexpression=project.version -q -DforceStdout)
echo $RESULT

For reference, see: https://maven.apache.org/plugins/maven-help-plugin/evaluate-mojo.html#forceStdout