Find Minecraft server logs and crash reports

When a Minecraft server stops, freezes or refuses to start, the reason is written down in one of a few places. This guide shows where each record lives, how to download it from the panel and what the parts of a crash report mean.

Checked against Minecraft 26.3 and Paper 26.3, October 2026.

Where Minecraft keeps its records

Open the File Manager. Everything below sits in your server's top folder.

• logs/latest.log is the current log. Older logs are rotated into the same folder with names like 2026-10-21-1.log.gz, which are compressed copies in the same format.
• crash-reports/ holds a text file for each Minecraft crash, named like crash-2026-10-21_14.32.07-server.txt. The name is the time of the crash, so the newest file is the one you want.
• hs_err_pid followed by a number, ending in .log is written when the Java process itself dies. Such a crash makes no file in crash-reports/.

Not every problem leaves a crash report, so check the log as well.

Download the log from the Console

The Console tab keeps a recording of the server's output. Open the menu on Download Log and pick a range: Last 1 minute, Last 5 minutes, Last 30 minutes, Last hour or Earlier boots (7 days).

The recording covers about the last hour. If the server has already restarted since the crash, choose Earlier boots (7 days). It adds the first and last lines of each boot from the past week, so the end of the boot that crashed is usually in there. A boot that ended while the site was restarting is missing, and a long boot keeps only its first 200 and last 300 lines. Clear Console only clears the lines on your screen, and Download Log still has the recorded log.

Open a file in the File Manager

1. Open the File Manager and click the crash-reports folder, or the logs folder for latest.log.
2. Double-click the file to read it, or select it and use Download. The editor opens text files up to 8 MB. Bigger files are downloaded instead.
3. A .log.gz file cannot be read in the panel. Download it and open it with an archive tool on your computer.

The Disk Analyser tab shows what is taking up your disk space, which is where an oversized logs folder would appear. Fix a server that is out of disk space covers clearing it.

Read a crash report

A report is long, and only a few parts matter.

• The top section starts with ---- Minecraft Crash Report ----, then a line starting with two slashes (a joke comment, which means nothing), a Time and a Description of what the game was doing. Below that is the exception and its stack trace. This section holds the main error.
• Look through the stack trace for the name of a mod or plugin. The first mod named is the place to start, though it can be a clash between mods rather than the mod at fault.
• System Details lists the operating system, the Java version and memory figures. On Fabric it also lists every mod under Fabric Mods:.
• If the report points to running out of memory, the server needed more than it had. Your RAM is fixed by your plan, so see Optimise a modded Minecraft server for what you can reduce.

On Paper you may also find a long block in latest.log that says "DO NOT REPORT THIS TO PAPER". That is a thread dump printed when one tick took more than 10 seconds. It is a warning of severe lag, not a crash, and its first lines show where the server was stuck.

Fix what it names

1. Create a backup first. Create and restore backups has the steps.
2. If a mod or plugin is named, open the Mods or Plugins tab, choose Installed, press Disable on it and restart from the Console. Update it with Check for updates if a newer build exists.
3. If the cause is not a mod, try the matching guide: Fix "Exception in server tick loop" or Fix a Minecraft server that won't start.