Python logs installation

Install OpenTelemetry packages

Required

Terminal
pip install opentelemetry-api opentelemetry-sdk opentelemetry-exporter-otlp

2
Get your project token
Required
You'll need your PostHog project token to authenticate log requests. This is the same key you use for capturing events and exceptions with the PostHog SDK.
Important: Use your project token which starts with phc_. Do not use a personal API key (which starts with phx_).
You can find your project token in Project Settings.

Configure the SDK

Required

Set up the OpenTelemetry SDK to send logs to PostHog.

Note: The logs API is still experimental in opentelemetry-python, so it's only exposed under the private _logs import path (e.g. opentelemetry._logs). Use these imports rather than opentelemetry.logs, which doesn't exist yet.

Python
import logging
from opentelemetry._logs import set_logger_provider
from opentelemetry.sdk._logs import LoggerProvider, LoggingHandler
from opentelemetry.sdk._logs.export import BatchLogRecordProcessor
from opentelemetry.exporter.otlp.proto.http._log_exporter import OTLPLogExporter

# Configure the logger provider
logger_provider = LoggerProvider()
set_logger_provider(logger_provider)

# Create OTLP exporter with API key in header
otlp_exporter = OTLPLogExporter(
    endpoint="https://us.i.posthog.com/i/v1/logs",
    headers={"Authorization": "Bearer <ph_project_token>"}
)

# Add processor
logger_provider.add_log_record_processor(
    BatchLogRecordProcessor(otlp_exporter)
)

# Attach the OpenTelemetry handler to the root logger
logging.getLogger().addHandler(LoggingHandler(logger_provider=logger_provider))

Alternatively, you can pass the API key as a query parameter:

Python
otlp_exporter = OTLPLogExporter(
    endpoint="https://us.i.posthog.com/i/v1/logs?token=<ph_project_token>"
)

Use OpenTelemetry logging

Required

With the handler attached in the previous step, you can start logging with standard Python logging and the records flow to PostHog:

Python
import logging

logging.basicConfig(level=logging.INFO)

# Use standard Python logging
logger = logging.getLogger("my-app")
logger.info("User action", extra={"userId": "123", "action": "login"})
logger.warning("Deprecated API used", extra={"endpoint": "/old-api"})
logger.error("Database connection failed", extra={"error": "Connection timeout"})

5
Test your setup
Recommended
Once everything is configured, test that logs are flowing into PostHog:
1. Send a test log from your application
2. Check the PostHog Logs interface for your log entries
3. Verify the logs appear in your project
View your logs in PostHog

Next steps

Checkpoint

What you can do with your logs

Action	Description
Why you need logs	What logs show you that nothing else does
Search logs	Use the search interface to find specific log entries
Filter by level	Filter by `INFO`, `WARN`, `ERROR`, etc.
Link session replay	Connect logs to users and session replays by passing `posthogDistinctId` and `sessionId`
Link logs to a person	Surface every log emitted on behalf of a user on their PostHog person profile
Logging best practices	Learn what to log, how to structure logs, and patterns that make logs useful in production

Troubleshoot common issues

Python logs installation

Install OpenTelemetry packages

Get your project token

Configure the SDK

Use OpenTelemetry logging

Test your setup

Next steps

Community questions

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