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NAME | SYNOPSIS | DESCRIPTION | CONFIGURATION DIRECTORIES AND PRECEDENCE | OPTIONS | SEE ALSO | NOTES | COLOPHON |
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COREDUMP.CONF(5) coredump.conf COREDUMP.CONF(5)
coredump.conf, coredump.conf.d - Core dump storage configuration
files
/etc/systemd/coredump.conf
/run/systemd/coredump.conf
/usr/local/lib/systemd/coredump.conf
/usr/lib/systemd/coredump.conf
/etc/systemd/coredump.conf.d/*.conf
/run/systemd/coredump.conf.d/*.conf
/usr/local/lib/systemd/coredump.conf.d/*.conf
/usr/lib/systemd/coredump.conf.d/*.conf
These files configure the behavior of systemd-coredump(8), a
handler for core dumps invoked by the kernel. Whether
systemd-coredump is used is determined by the kernel's
kernel.core_pattern sysctl(8) setting. See systemd-coredump(8) and
core(5) pages for the details.
The default configuration is set during compilation, so
configuration is only needed when it is necessary to deviate from
those defaults. The main configuration file is loaded from one of
the listed directories in order of priority, only the first file
found is used: /etc/systemd/, /run/systemd/,
/usr/local/lib/systemd/ [1], /usr/lib/systemd/. The vendor version
of the file contains commented out entries showing the defaults as
a guide to the administrator. Local overrides can also be created
by creating drop-ins, as described below. The main configuration
file can also be edited for this purpose (or a copy in /etc/ if it
is shipped under /usr/), however using drop-ins for local
configuration is recommended over modifications to the main
configuration file.
In addition to the main configuration file, drop-in configuration
snippets are read from /usr/lib/systemd/*.conf.d/,
/usr/local/lib/systemd/*.conf.d/, and /etc/systemd/*.conf.d/.
Those drop-ins have higher precedence and override the main
configuration file. Files in the *.conf.d/ configuration
subdirectories are sorted by their filename in lexicographic
order, regardless of in which of the subdirectories they reside.
When multiple files specify the same option, for options which
accept just a single value, the entry in the file sorted last
takes precedence, and for options which accept a list of values,
entries are collected as they occur in the sorted files.
When packages need to customize the configuration, they can
install drop-ins under /usr/. Files in /etc/ are reserved for the
local administrator, who may use this logic to override the
configuration files installed by vendor packages. Drop-ins have to
be used to override package drop-ins, since the main configuration
file has lower precedence. It is recommended to prefix all
filenames in those subdirectories with a two-digit number and a
dash, to simplify the ordering. This also defines a concept of
drop-in priorities to allow OS vendors to ship drop-ins within a
specific range lower than the range used by users. This should
lower the risk of package drop-ins overriding accidentally
drop-ins defined by users. It is recommended to use the range
10-40 for drop-ins in /usr/ and the range 60-90 for drop-ins in
/etc/ and /run/, to make sure that local and transient drop-ins
take priority over drop-ins shipped by the OS vendor.
To disable a configuration file supplied by the vendor, the
recommended way is to place a symlink to /dev/null in the
configuration directory in /etc/, with the same filename as the
vendor configuration file.
All options are configured in the [Coredump] section:
Storage=
Controls where to store cores. One of "none", "external", and
"journal". When "none", the core dumps may be logged
(including the backtrace if possible), but not stored
permanently. When "external" (the default), cores will be
stored in /var/lib/systemd/coredump/. When "journal", cores
will be stored in the journal and rotated following normal
journal rotation patterns.
When cores are stored in the journal, they might be compressed
following journal compression settings, see journald.conf(5).
When cores are stored externally, they will be compressed by
default, see below.
Note that in order to process a coredump (i.e. extract a stack
trace) the core must be written to disk first. Thus, unless
ProcessSizeMax= is set to 0 (see below), the core will be
written to /var/lib/systemd/coredump/ either way (under a
temporary filename, or even in an unlinked file), Storage=
thus only controls whether to leave it there even after it was
processed.
Added in version 215.
Compress=
Controls compression for external storage. Takes a boolean
argument, which defaults to "yes".
Added in version 215.
ProcessSizeMax=
The maximum size in bytes of a core which will be processed.
Core dumps exceeding this size may be stored, but the stack
trace will not be generated. Like other sizes in this same
config file, the usual suffixes to the base of 1024 are
allowed (B, K, M, G, T, P, and E). Defaults to 1G on 32-bit
systems, 32G on 64-bit systems.
Setting Storage=none and ProcessSizeMax=0 disables all
coredump handling except for a log entry.
Added in version 215.
EnterNamespace=
For processes belonging to a PID namespace, controls whether
systemd-coredump(8) shall attempt to process core dumps on the
host, using debug information from the file system hierarchy
(i.e. the mount namespace) of the process that crashed. Access
to the process' file system hierarchy might be necessary to
generate a fully symbolized backtrace. If set to "yes",
systemd-coredump will obtain the tree of mounts from the
crashing process' mount namespace and will try to generate the
stack trace in host context using the debug information of
binaries and libraries contained in the crashing process'
hierarchy. Defaults to "no", i.e. no attempt is made to
acquire external debug information from the process' mount
namespace, in order to maximize security. This option has no
effect on processes that are part of the host's PID namespace.
Note that the coredump of the namespaced process is still
saved in /var/lib/systemd/coredump/ on the host even if
EnterNamespace= is set to "no" (subject to Storage=).
Note that EnterNamespace= only has an effect if a core dump is
generated by a container whose unit does not have
CoredumpReceive= enabled.
Note that it's typically preferable to let containers and
other namespace-based sandboxes process their own coredumps,
if possible, for best security. This may be enabled on the
container's unit via the CoredumpReceive= setting, see
systemd.resource-control(5) for details.
Added in version 257.
ExternalSizeMax=, JournalSizeMax=
The maximum (compressed or uncompressed) size in bytes of a
coredump to be saved in separate files on disk (default: 1G on
32-bit systems, 32G on 64-bit systems) or in the journal
(default: 767M). Note that the journal service enforces a hard
limit on journal log records of 767M, and will ignore larger
submitted log records. Hence, JournalSizeMax= may be lowered
relative to the default, but not increased. Unit suffixes are
allowed just as in ProcessSizeMax=.
ExternalSizeMax=infinity sets the core size to unlimited.
Added in version 215.
MaxUse=, KeepFree=
Enforce limits on the disk space, specified in bytes, taken up
by externally stored core dumps. Unit suffixes are allowed
just as in ProcessSizeMax=. MaxUse= makes sure that old core
dumps are removed as soon as the total disk space taken up by
core dumps grows beyond this limit (defaults to 10% of the
total disk size). KeepFree= controls how much disk space to
keep free at least (defaults to 15% of the total disk size).
Note that the disk space used by core dumps might temporarily
exceed these limits while core dumps are processed. Note that
old core dumps are also removed based on time via
systemd-tmpfiles(8). Set either value to 0 to turn off
size-based cleanup.
Added in version 215.
Use
systemd-analyze cat-config systemd/coredump.conf
to display the full config.
systemd-journald.service(8), coredumpctl(1), systemd-tmpfiles(8)
1. 💣💥🧨💥💥💣 Please note that those configuration files must
be available at all times. If /usr/local/ is a separate
partition, it may not be available during early boot, and must
not be used for configuration.
This page is part of the systemd (systemd system and service
manager) project. Information about the project can be found at
⟨http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/systemd⟩. If you have a
bug report for this manual page, see
⟨http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/systemd/#bugreports⟩.
This page was obtained from the project's upstream Git repository
⟨https://github.com/systemd/systemd.git⟩ on 2025-08-11. (At that
time, the date of the most recent commit that was found in the
repository was 2025-08-11.) If you discover any rendering
problems in this HTML version of the page, or you believe there is
a better or more up-to-date source for the page, or you have
corrections or improvements to the information in this COLOPHON
(which is not part of the original manual page), send a mail to
[email protected]
systemd 258~rc2 COREDUMP.CONF(5)
Pages that refer to this page: coredumpctl(1), systemd.directives(7), systemd.index(7), systemd-coredump(8)
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HTML rendering created 2025-09-06 by Michael Kerrisk, author of The Linux Programming Interface. For details of in-depth Linux/UNIX system programming training courses that I teach, look here. Hosting by jambit GmbH. |
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