Install Vector from archives

This page covers installing Vector from a pre-built archive. These archives contain the vector binary as well as supporting configuration files.

We recommend installing Vector through a supported platform or package manager, if possible. These handle permissions, directory creation, and other intricacies covered in the Next Steps section.

Installation

Linux (ARM64)

Download and unpack the archive:

# Latest (0.28.1)
mkdir -p vector && \
  curl -sSfL --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 https://packages.timber.io/vector/0.28.1/vector-0.28.1-aarch64-unknown-linux-musl.tar.gz | \
  tar xzf - -C vector --strip-components=2

# Nightly
mkdir -p vector && \
  curl -sSfL --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 https://packages.timber.io/vector/nightly/latest/vector-nightly-aarch64-unknown-linux-musl.tar.gz | \
  tar xzf - -C vector --strip-components=2

Change into the vector directory:

cd vector

Move Vector into your $PATH:

echo "export PATH=\"$(pwd)/vector/bin:\$PATH\"" >> $HOME/.profile
source $HOME/.profile

Start Vector:

vector --config config/vector.toml

Linux (ARMv7)

Download and unpack the archive:

# Latest (0.28.1)
mkdir -p vector && \
  curl -sSfL --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 https://packages.timber.io/vector/0.28.1/vector-0.28.1-armv7-unknown-linux-gnueabihf.tar.gz | \
  tar xzf - -C vector --strip-components=2

# Nightly
mkdir -p vector && \
  curl -sSfL --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 https://packages.timber.io/vector/nightly/latest/vector-nightly-armv7-unknown-linux-gnueabihf.tar.gz | \
  tar xzf - -C vector --strip-components=2

Change into the vector directory:

cd vector

Move Vector into your $PATH:

echo "export PATH=\"$(pwd)/vector/bin:\$PATH\"" >> $HOME/.profile
source $HOME/.profile

Start Vector:

vector --config config/vector.toml

macoS (x86_64)

Download and unpack the archive:

# Latest (version 0.28.1)
mkdir -p vector && \
  curl -sSfL --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 https://packages.timber.io/vector/0.28.1/vector-0.28.1-x86_64-apple-darwin.tar.gz  | \
  tar xzf - -C vector --strip-components=2

# Nightly
mkdir -p vector && \
  curl -sSfL --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 https://packages.timber.io/vector/nightly/latest/vector-nightly-x86_64-apple-darwin.tar.gz  | \
  tar xzf - -C vector --strip-components=2

Change into the vector directory:

cd vector

Move Vector into your $PATH:

echo "export PATH=\"$(pwd)/vector/bin:\$PATH\"" >> $HOME/.profile
source $HOME/.profile

Start Vector:

vector --config config/vector.toml

Windows (x86_64)

Download the Vector release archive:

# Latest (version 0.28.1)
powershell Invoke-WebRequest https://packages.timber.io/vector//vector--x86_64-pc-windows-msvc.zip -OutFile vector--x86_64-pc-windows-msvc.zip


# Nightly
powershell Invoke-WebRequest https://packages.timber.io/vector/0.12.X/vector-nightly-x86_64-pc-windows-msvc.zip -OutFile vector-nightly-x86_64-pc-windows-msvc.zip

Extract files from the archive:

powershell Expand-Archive vector-nightly-x86_64-pc-windows-msvc.zip .

Navigate to the Vector directory:

cd vector-nightly-x86_64-pc-windows-msvc

Start Vector:

.\bin\vector --config config\vector.toml

Linux (x86_64)

Download and unpack the archive:

# Latest (version 0.28.1)
mkdir -p vector && \
  curl -sSfL --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 https://packages.timber.io/vector/0.28.1/vector-0.28.1-x86_64-unknown-linux-musl.tar.gz  | \
  tar xzf - -C vector --strip-components=2

# Nightly
mkdir -p vector && \
  curl -sSfL --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 https://packages.timber.io/vector/nightly/latest/vector-nightly-x86_64-unknown-linux-musl.tar.gz | \
  tar xzf - -C vector --strip-components=2

Change into the vector directory:

cd vector

Move Vector into your $PATH:

echo "export PATH=\"$(pwd)/vector/bin:\$PATH\"" >> $HOME/.profile
source $HOME/.profile

Start Vector:

vector --config config/vector.toml

Next steps

Configuring

The Vector configuration file is located at:

config/vector.toml

Example configurations are located in config/vector/examples/*. You can learn more about configuring Vector in the Configuration documentation.

Data directory

We recommend creating a data directory that Vector can use:

mkdir /var/lib/vector

Make sure that this directory is writable by the vector process.

Vector offers a global data_dir option that you can use to specify the path of your directory:

data_dir = "/var/lib/vector" # default

Service managers

Vector archives ship with service files in case you need them:

Init.d

To install Vector into init.d, run:

cp -av etc/init.d/vector /etc/init.d

Systemd

To install Vector into Systemd, run:

cp -av etc/systemd/vector.service /etc/systemd/system

Updating

To update Vector, follow the same installation instructions above.