Location of vCenter Server Logs on Windows Server and Appliance

Location of vCenter Server Logs on Windows Server and Appliance

The main focus of this post is to mention the location of vCenter Server Logs. These logs are very necessary for Technical Troubleshooting related to vCenter Server. As we know vCenter Server service can be installed on Windows Server as well as on an Appliance. The location of this logs also varies on different Operating Systems. There are more detailed articles on VMware blogs for more indepth logs and their locations for various VMware products. Here I am only focussing on vCenter Server Logs. In the upcoming posts I will also provide locations of various other VMware products.

There are 2 methods to fetch the VMware vCenter logs
1. By Connecting to VMware vsphere client or web client and logging onto the vCenter Server
2. By either taking a RDP session to vCenter Server [Hosted on Windows Server] and accessing the share paths given below OR by connecting to vCenter Server via SSH [Hosted on Appliance]

1. By Connecting to VMware vsphere client or web client and logging onto the vCenter Server
a. Connect to VMware vCenter via vsphere or web client
b. Go to Home screen -> Click on System Logs
c. At the top, click on Export System Logs
d. On the next prompt, select the VCenter Tree and enter the destination where you need the logs to be exported.

2. By either taking a RDP session to vCenter Server [Hosted on Windows Server] and accessing the share paths given below OR by connecting to vCenter Server via SSH [Hosted on Appliance]

A) On Windows Server having vCenter Server Service Installed

> vCenter Server 5.X and earlier version [if installed on Windows XP, 2000 or 2003] -> %ALLUSERSPROFILE%\Application Data\VMware\VMware VirtualCenter\Logs

> vCenter Server 5.X and earlier version [if installed on Windows Vista, 7 or 2008] -> C:\ProgramData\VMware\VMware Virtualization\Logs\

> vCenter Server 6.0 -> %ALLUSERSPROFILE%\VMWare\vCenterServer\logs

Note: If the vCenter Service is running with a different account, then the logs would be present under that accounts profile instead of %ALLUSERPROFILE%

B) On Appliances having vCenter Server Service Installed
> vCenter Server Appliance 5.X -> /var/log/vmware/vpx

> vCenter Server Appliance 5.X UI -> /var/log/vmware/vami


> vCenter Server Appliance 6.0 -> /var/log/vmware/

>> References:
https://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/search.do?cmd=displayKC&docType=kc&docTypeID=DT_KB_1_1&externalId=1021804


https://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/search.do?cmd=displayKC&docType=kc&docTypeID=DT_KB_1_1&externalId=2110014