---
title: Reports
description: Generate and interpret Nextflow execution reports, timelines, trace files, and workflow diagrams.
---

# Reports

Nextflow provides several reporting mechanisms to analyze and debug pipeline runs:

- [Execution log](#execution-log): Command to query information about past runs
- [Execution report](#execution-report): Comprehensive HTML report for a pipeline run
- [Execution timeline](#execution-timeline): HTML timeline of tasks executed in a pipeline run
- [Trace file](#trace-file): CSV file with detailed task metrics for a pipeline run
- [Workflow diagram](#workflow-diagram): Graph visualization of pipeline structure

## Execution log

The `nextflow log` command shows information about past pipeline runs and task executions. You can query by run name or session ID, and the command provides multiple options to filter and format the output.

By default, `nextflow log` prints the list of pipeline runs:

```console
$ nextflow log
TIMESTAMP               DURATION        RUN NAME                STATUS  REVISION ID     SESSION ID                              COMMAND
2025-12-09 11:43:18     1s              naughty_heisenberg      OK      2ce0b0e294      bae65ec6-a2b9-49bf-b63e-2fec91945e48    nextflow run hello
2025-12-09 11:43:28     931ms           thirsty_swanson         OK      2ce0b0e294      bae65ec6-a2b9-49bf-b63e-2fec91945e48    nextflow run hello -resume
2025-12-09 11:43:37     8.5s            goofy_kilby             OK      ca20a6dfd2      d0a60572-076e-451a-b10e-16059ed77e36    nextflow run rnaseq-nf -profile conda
```

Providing a run name or session ID prints the tasks executed by that pipeline run:

```console
$ nextflow log goofy_kilby
/Users/user/workspace/work/e1/fc2d06782f8263476426c576888033
/Users/user/workspace/work/72/f0542cfa81ad6abeaf1adf02e5cc2b
/Users/user/workspace/work/83/009346a3958358bb704e996d935c7a
/Users/user/workspace/work/84/15e4cd16df1db6f9bc0e22cc05316d
```

### Customizing fields

The `-f` (`-fields`) option specifies which fields to include in the log.

```bash
nextflow log <run-name> -f [fields]
```

You can set a custom list of fields to focus on specific information. For example, `hash`, `name`, `exit`, and `status`:

```console
$ nextflow log goofy_kilby -f hash,name,exit,status
e1/fc2d06       RNASEQ:INDEX  (ggal_1_48850000_49020000) 0       COMPLETED
72/f0542c       RNASEQ:FASTQC (ggal_gut)                 0       COMPLETED
83/009346       RNASEQ:QUANT  (ggal_gut)                 0       COMPLETED
84/15e4cd       MULTIQC                                  0       COMPLETED
```

Run the `log` command with the `-l` option to see the full list of fields. See [log][cli-log] for more information.

### Templates

The `-t` option specifies a template (string or file) to use when inspecting a single run:

```bash
nextflow log <run-name> -t <template> > <report>
```

You can create a template. For example, in Markdown:

```md
## $name

script:

    $script

exit status: $exit
task status: $status
task folder: $folder
```

Then, use it to create a report:

```bash
nextflow log goofy_kilby -t my-template.md > execution-report.md
```

### Filtering

The `filter` option selects which entries to include in the log.

```bash
nextflow log <run-name> -filter '<filters>'
```

Any valid Groovy boolean expression on the log fields can be used to define the filter condition. For example, you can filter for task names matching a pattern:

```bash
nextflow log goofy_kilby -filter 'name =~ /hello.*/ && status == "FAILED"'
```

## Execution report

The execution report is an HTML report that includes metrics about a pipeline run. The report is organized into three sections: **Summary**, **Resources**, and **Tasks**.

To enable the execution report, add the `-with-report` option when launching a pipeline run:

```bash
nextflow run <pipeline> -with-report [file_name]
```

You can also enable the report in your Nextflow configuration:

```groovy
report {
    enabled = true
    file = 'report.html'
}
```

See [report][config-report] for the list of available config options.

### Summary

The **Summary** section reports the execution status, the launch command, overall execution time, and other workflow metadata:

![Report summary](_static/report-summary-min.png)

### Resource usage

The **Resources** section plots the distribution of resource usage for each workflow process using the interactive [plotly.js](https://plot.ly/javascript/) plotting library.

Plots are shown for CPU, memory, job duration, and disk I/O. Each usage metric is shown both in raw form and as a percentage of the requested resources. These plots are helpful to check that task resources are used efficiently.

![Usage CPUs](_static/report-resources-min.png)

For information about how resource usage is computed, see [Understanding task resource metrics][metrics-page].

### Tasks

The **Tasks** section lists all executed tasks, reporting the status, command script, and other metrics for each task:

![Tasks](_static/report-tasks-min.png)

The same caveats for the [trace file][trace-report] also apply to the task table.

## Execution timeline

The execution timeline is an HTML report that shows a timeline of the tasks executed in a pipeline run:

![Execution timeline](_static/timeline-min.png)

The x-axis shows elapsed time relative to workflow launch. The y-axis shows a bar for each task execution. Each bar has the following properties (with the equivalent trace fields in parentheses):

- Bar length: Task duration (`duration`)
- Bar color: Identifies tasks from the same process
- Colored area: Real execution time (`realtime`)
- Gray area (left): Task scheduling time (`start - submit`)
- Gray area (right): Task termination time (`complete - start - realtime`)
- Label: Task duration (`duration`) and peak memory usage (`peak_rss`)

To enable the execution timeline, add the `-with-timeline` option when launching a pipeline run:

```bash
nextflow run <pipeline> -with-timeline [file_name]
```

You can also enable the execution timeline in your Nextflow configuration:

```groovy
timeline {
    enabled = true
    file = 'timeline.html'
}
```

See [timeline][config-timeline] for the list of available config options.

## Trace file

The trace file is a CSV file containing information about each task executed in a pipeline run, including submission time, start time, completion time, CPU usage, and memory usage.

To create the trace file, add the `-with-trace` option when launching a pipeline:

```bash
nextflow run <pipeline> -with-trace
```

The above command creates a file named `trace.txt` in the current directory. For example:

| task_id | hash      | native_id | name           | status    | exit | submit                  | duration | realtime | %cpu   | peak_rss  | peak_vmem | rchar    | wchar    |
| ------- | --------- | --------- | -------------- | --------- | ---- | ----------------------- | -------- | -------- | ------ | --------- | --------- | -------- | -------- |
| 19      | 45/ab752a | 2032      | blast (1)      | COMPLETED | 0    | 2014-10-23 16:33:16.288 | 1m       | 5s       | 0.0%   | 29.8 MB   | 354 MB    | 33.3 MB  | 0        |
| 20      | 72/db873d | 2033      | blast (2)      | COMPLETED | 0    | 2014-10-23 16:34:17.211 | 30s      | 10s      | 35.7%  | 152.8 MB  | 428.1 MB  | 192.7 MB | 1 MB     |
| 21      | 53/d13188 | 2034      | blast (3)      | COMPLETED | 0    | 2014-10-23 16:34:17.518 | 29s      | 20s      | 4.5%   | 289.5 MB  | 381.6 MB  | 33.3 MB  | 0        |
| 28      | b4/0f9613 | 2041      | exonerate (1)  | COMPLETED | 0    | 2014-10-23 16:38:19.657 | 1m 30s   | 1m 11s   | 94.3%  | 611.6 MB  | 693.8 MB  | 961.2 GB | 6.1 GB   |
| 31      | d7/eabe51 | 2042      | exonerate (3)  | COMPLETED | 0    | 2014-10-23 16:45:50.846 | 3m 1s    | 2m 6s    | 130.1% | 703.3 MB  | 760.9 MB  | 1.1 TB   | 28.6 GB  |
| 30      | 4f/1ad1f0 | 2043      | exonerate (2)  | COMPLETED | 0    | 2014-10-23 16:45:50.961 | 10m 2s   | 9m 16s   | 95.5%  | 706.2 MB  | 764 MB    | 1.6 TB   | 172.4 GB |
| 52      | 72/41d0c6 | 2055      | similarity (1) | COMPLETED | 0    | 2014-10-23 17:13:23.543 | 30s      | 352ms    | 0.0%   | 35.6 MB   | 58.3 MB   | 199.3 MB | 7.9 MB   |
| 53      | 3e/bca30f | 2061      | similarity (2) | COMPLETED | 0    | 2014-10-23 17:13:23.770 | 30s      | 238ms    | 0.0%   | 6.7 MB    | 29.6 MB   | 190 MB   | 91.2 MB  |
| 54      | 8b/d45b47 | 2062      | similarity (3) | COMPLETED | 0    | 2014-10-23 17:13:23.808 | 30s      | 442ms    | 0.0%   | 108.1 MB  | 158 MB    | 832 MB   | 565.6 MB |
| 98      | de/d6c0a6 | 2099      | matrix (1)     | COMPLETED | 0    | 2014-10-23 17:14:27.139 | 30s      | 1s       | 0.0%   | 4.8 MB    | 42 MB     | 240.6 MB | 79 KB    |

The following caveats apply to trace metrics:

- Nextflow collects trace metrics through a background process for each job in the target environment. Make sure the following tools are available in the environment where tasks are executed: `awk`, `date`, `grep`, `ps`, `sed`, `tail`, `tee`. Container images that do not include all of these tools may lead to missing data.

- Trace metrics provide an estimation of the resources used by running tasks. They are not an alternative to low-level performance analysis tools, and they may not be accurate for very short-lived tasks (e.g., less than a few seconds).

- Some trace metrics are not reported when running on macOS.

You can also enable the trace file in your Nextflow configuration:

```groovy
trace {
    enabled = true
    file = 'trace.txt'
}
```

See [trace][config-trace] for the list of available config options.

## Workflow diagram

A Nextflow pipeline can be represented as a directed acyclic graph (DAG). The vertices in the graph represent the pipeline's processes and operators, while the edges represent the data dependencies (i.e., channels) between them.

To render the workflow DAG, run your pipeline with the `-with-dag` option. By default, it creates a file named `dag-<timestamp>.html` with the workflow DAG rendered as a [Mermaid](https://mermaid.js.org/) diagram.

The workflow DAG can be rendered in a different format by specifying an output file name with a different extension based on the desired format. For example:

```bash
nextflow run main.nf -with-dag flowchart.png
```

:::tip
Use the `-preview` option with `-with-dag` to render the workflow DAG without executing any tasks.
:::

The following example shows the Mermaid diagram for the [rnaseq-nf](https://github.com/nextflow-io/rnaseq-nf) pipeline (using the [Mermaid Live Editor](https://mermaid-js.github.io/mermaid-live-editor/edit) with the `default` theme):

```bash
nextflow run rnaseq-nf -preview -with-dag
```

```mermaid
%%{
    init: {
        'theme': 'base',
        'themeVariables': {
            'primaryColor': '#B6ECE2',
            'primaryTextColor': '#160F26',
            'primaryBorderColor': '#065647',
            'lineColor': '#545555',
            'clusterBkg': '#BABCBD22',
            'clusterBorder': '#DDDEDE',
            'fontFamily': 'degular'
        }
    }
}%%
flowchart TB
    subgraph " "
    v0["Channel.fromFilePairs"]
    v1["transcriptome"]
    v7["config"]
    end
    subgraph RNASEQ
    v2([INDEX])
    v3([FASTQC])
    v4([QUANT])
    end
    v8([MULTIQC])
    subgraph " "
    v9[" "]
    end
    v5(( ))
    v0 --> v3
    v0 --> v4
    v1 --> v2
    v2 --> v4
    v3 --> v5
    v4 --> v5
    v7 --> v8
    v5 --> v8
    v8 --> v9
```

See [dag][config-dag] for the list of available config options.

[cli-log]: ./reference/cli/log
[config-dag]: ./reference/config/dag
[config-report]: ./reference/config/report
[config-timeline]: ./reference/config/timeline
[config-trace]: ./reference/config/trace
[metrics-page]: ./tutorials/metrics
[trace-file]: ./reports#trace-file
[trace-report]: ./reports#trace-file
