Service Control

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What You'll Learn

How to start, stop, restart, and reload the Netdata Agent across different operating systems and service management systems.

The Netdata Agent automatically starts at boot after installation.

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Important

In most cases, you need to restart the Netdata service to apply changes to configuration files. Health configuration files, which define alerts, are an exception. They can be reloaded without restarting.

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Service Restart Impact

Restarting the Netdata Agent will cause temporary gaps in your collected metrics. This occurs while the netdata process reinitializes its data collectors and database engine.

UNIX

Using systemctl, service, or init.d

Action	Systemd	Non-systemd
start	sudo systemctl start netdata	sudo service netdata start or sudo /etc/init.d/netdata start
stop	sudo systemctl stop netdata	sudo service netdata stop or sudo /etc/init.d/netdata stop
restart	sudo systemctl restart netdata	sudo service netdata restart or sudo /etc/init.d/netdata restart
status	sudo systemctl status netdata	sudo service netdata status or sudo /etc/init.d/netdata status

Check status

Use the commands above to check whether the Netdata Agent service is running.

You can also verify that the Agent is reachable by opening http://NODE:19999 in a browser, or by running:

curl http://NODE:19999/api/v1/info

Replace NODE with the IP address or hostname of your Agent.

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Use sudo netdatacli ping to check whether the Agent is ready. It outputs pong with exit code 0 when the Agent is ready, exit code 1 while still initializing, and exit code 255 if the Agent is unreachable.

Using netdata

Use the netdata command, typically located at /usr/sbin/netdata, to start the Netdata daemon.

sudo netdata

If you start the daemon this way, close it with sudo killall netdata.

Using netdatacli

The Netdata Agent also comes with a CLI tool capable of performing shutdowns. Start the Agent back up using your preferred method listed above.

sudo netdatacli shutdown-agent

Reload health

No need to restart the Netdata Agent after modifying health configuration files (alerts). Use netdatacli to avoid metric collection gaps.

sudo netdatacli reload-health

Windows

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Administrator Access Required

You will need to run PowerShell as administrator.

Using Windows Services GUI

Manage Through Task Manager

If you prefer to manage the Agent through the GUI, you can start-stop and restart the Netdata service from the "Services" tab of Task Manager.

Using PowerShell Commands

• To start Netdata, run Start-Service Netdata.
• To stop Netdata, run Stop-Service Netdata.
• To restart Netdata, run Restart-Service Netdata.

Quick Reference

UNIX Commands Summary

Task	Systemd	Non-systemd	Direct Command
Start	sudo systemctl start netdata	sudo service netdata start or sudo /etc/init.d/netdata start	sudo netdata
Stop	sudo systemctl stop netdata	sudo service netdata stop or sudo /etc/init.d/netdata stop	sudo killall netdata
Restart	sudo systemctl restart netdata	sudo service netdata restart or sudo /etc/init.d/netdata restart	Stop + Start
Status	sudo systemctl status netdata	sudo service netdata status or sudo /etc/init.d/netdata status	curl http://NODE:19999/api/v1/info
Reload Health	sudo netdatacli reload-health	sudo netdatacli reload-health	sudo netdatacli reload-health
Shutdown	sudo netdatacli shutdown-agent	sudo netdatacli shutdown-agent	sudo netdatacli shutdown-agent

Windows Commands Summary

Task	PowerShell Command	GUI Location
Start	Start-Service Netdata	Task Manager > Services > Netdata
Stop	Stop-Service Netdata	Task Manager > Services > Netdata
Restart	Restart-Service Netdata	Task Manager > Services > Netdata