Where Does atop Store Daily Logs?
atop writes compressed daily logs in /var/log/atop, one file per day for replay with atop -r.
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atop records system snapshots into daily log files under /var/log/atop. Each file covers one day of CPU, memory, disk, and process data in compressed form. The daemon writes them on schedule without further setup.
Replay any day with atop against the file path. Retention follows the logrotate or timer policy, which varies by distro. Copy a day file elsewhere to keep it past rotation for postmortems.
Where atop stores this, by platform
/var/log/atop
One compressed log per day named by date. Replay with atop -r on the file. Retention policy varies by distro timer or logrotate.
Frequently asked questions
How do I view yesterday's processes?
Run atop -r on the dated file in /var/log/atop and step through snapshots. The file holds per interval process tables. Copy it aside before rotation deletes it.
Why is /var/log/atop so large?
Busy machines snapshot often with full process detail. Shorten retention in the distro timer or logrotate config. Keep incident days compressed elsewhere.
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