docs/category-overview-pages/working-with-logs.md
This section talks about the ways Netdata collects and visualizes logs.
The systemd journal plugin is the core Netdata component for reading systemd journal logs.
For structured logs, Netdata provides tools like log2journal and systemd-cat-native to convert them into compatible systemd journal entries.
Linux distributions without systemd, such as Alpine Linux, cannot use the systemd journal plugin locally because it requires a local systemd-journald installation. Note that log2journal itself does not require systemd — it is a standalone text processor that can run on any Linux system to convert log files to Journal Export Format. The converted output can then be piped to systemd-cat-native --url for remote forwarding (see option 1 below).
You can still make logs available in Netdata using these alternatives:
Remote journal forwarding with systemd-cat-native --url — Use systemd-cat-native --url=URL to send logs directly to a remote systemd-journal-remote running on another Linux system with systemd. This mode works even when the local system has no systemd, allowing the remote systemd journal to become the logs database for the local system. The receiving system must have systemd-journal-remote configured and accessible at the specified URL.
OpenTelemetry (OTLP) log ingestion — Follow Ingest OpenTelemetry Metrics and Logs to receive logs through OTLP/gRPC and index them for fast querying in the Logs tab (the otel-logs source). This method does not depend on a local systemd installation.
You can also find useful guides on how to set up log centralization points in the Observability Centralization Points section of our docs.