[php] Where are Magento's log files located?

I am new to Magento. I can't find log files in Magento. I googled it, but the Magento Commerce site returns closed and some other sites explain how to create custom log files. I want to know the location of built-in log files.

This question is related to php magento error-log

The answer is


These code lines can help you quickly enable log setting in your magento site.

INSERT INTO `core_config_data` (`config_id`, `scope`, `scope_id`, `path`, `value`) VALUES
('', 'default', 0, 'dev/log/active', '1'),
('', 'default', 0, 'dev/log/file', 'system.log'),
('', 'default', 0, 'dev/log/exception_file', 'exception.log');

Then you can see them inside the folder: /var/log under root installation.

More detail in this blog


To create your custom log file, try this code

Mage::log('your debug message', null, 'yourlog_filename.log');

Refer this Answer


You can find the log within you Magento root directory under

var/log

there are two types of log files system.log and exception.log

you need to give the correct permission to var folder, then enable logging from your Magento admin by going to

System > Configuration> Developer > Log Settings > Enable = Yes

system.log is used for general debugging and catches almost all log entries from Magento, including warning, debug and errors messages from both native and custom modules.

exception.log is reserved for exceptions only, for example when you are using try-catch statement.

To output to either the default system.log or the exception.log see the following code examples:

Mage::log('My log entry');
Mage::log('My log message: '.$myVariable);
Mage::log($myArray);
Mage::log($myObject);
Mage::logException($e);

You can create your own log file for more debugging

Mage::log('My log entry', null, 'mylogfile.log');