# Beats logs going to syslog and not defined file path

**URL:** <https://discuss.elastic.co/t/beats-logs-going-to-syslog-and-not-defined-file-path/176938>\
**Category:** Beats\
**Created:** [April 15, 2019, 4:31pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/beats-logs-going-to-syslog-and-not-defined-file-path/176938 "2019-04-15T16:31:48Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![ocabj](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/f6c823/32.png) [@ocabj](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/ocabj)\
**Post date:** [April 15, 2019, 4:31pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/beats-logs-going-to-syslog-and-not-defined-file-path/176938/1 "2019-04-15T16:31:48Z")

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I have always used /var/log/[name]beats as the path for the beats logs. But ever since 6.7 to 7.0, the beats logs are going to local syslog. I even hard set logging.to\_syslog: false but beats still writes out to /var/log/messages (Centos). Any ideas?

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**Author:** ![jsoriano](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/jsoriano/32/27920_2.png) [@jsoriano](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/jsoriano)\
**Post date:** [April 16, 2019, 8:40am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/beats-logs-going-to-syslog-and-not-defined-file-path/176938/2 "2019-04-16T08:40:33Z")

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Hi @ocabj,

In 7.0 we changed the behaviour of Beats when used with systemd so they log to the standard output and let systemd manage the logs. This way it is more consistent with services in systemd-based systems.  
If you want to override this behaviour please take a look to [this documentation](https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/beats/filebeat/7.0/running-with-systemd.html#_customize_systemd_unit_for_filebeat).

If you are not using systemd the behaviour shouldn't have changed.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![ocabj](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/f6c823/32.png) [@ocabj](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/ocabj)\
**Post date:** [April 16, 2019, 4:03pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/beats-logs-going-to-syslog-and-not-defined-file-path/176938/3 "2019-04-16T16:03:20Z")

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@jsoriano

Thank you. I was able to restore logging to /var/log/{name}beats and stop logging to syslog by overriding "BEAT\_LOG\_OPTS=".

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**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/original/3X/1/a/1ac57faf039f6b580b3f104ef42a2a89e41014de.png) [@system](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/system)\
**Post date:** [May 14, 2019, 6:03pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/beats-logs-going-to-syslog-and-not-defined-file-path/176938/4 "2019-05-14T18:03:22Z")

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