This document is for Celery's development version, which can be significantly different from previous releases. Get old docs here: 2.5.

Running celeryd as a daemon

Celery does not daemonize itself, please use one of the following daemonization tools.

Generic init scripts

See the contrib/generic-init.d/ directory Celery distribution.

This directory contains generic bash init scripts for celeryd, that should run on Linux, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, and other Unix platforms.

Init script: celeryd

Usage:/etc/init.d/celeryd {start|stop|restart|status}
Configuration file:
 /etc/default/celeryd

To configure celeryd you probably need to at least tell it where to change directory to when it starts (to find your celeryconfig).

Example configuration

This is an example configuration for a Python project.

/etc/default/celeryd:

# Name of nodes to start
# here we have a single node
CELERYD_NODES="w1"
# or we could have three nodes:
#CELERYD_NODES="w1 w2 w3"

# Where to chdir at start.
CELERYD_CHDIR="/opt/Myproject/"

# Extra arguments to celeryd
CELERYD_OPTS="--time-limit=300 --concurrency=8"

# Name of the celery config module.
CELERY_CONFIG_MODULE="celeryconfig"

# %n will be replaced with the nodename.
CELERYD_LOG_FILE="/var/log/celery/%n.log"
CELERYD_PID_FILE="/var/run/celery/%n.pid"

# Workers should run as an unprivileged user.
CELERYD_USER="celery"
CELERYD_GROUP="celery"

Example Django configuration

This is an example configuration for those using django-celery:

# Name of nodes to start, here we have a single node
CELERYD_NODES="w1"
# or we could have three nodes:
#CELERYD_NODES="w1 w2 w3"

# Where to chdir at start.
CELERYD_CHDIR="/opt/Myproject/"

# How to call "manage.py celeryd_multi"
CELERYD_MULTI="$CELERYD_CHDIR/manage.py celeryd_multi"

# How to call "manage.py celeryctl"
CELERYCTL="$CELERYD_CHDIR/manage.py celeryctl"

# Extra arguments to celeryd
CELERYD_OPTS="--time-limit=300 --concurrency=8"

# Name of the celery config module.
CELERY_CONFIG_MODULE="celeryconfig"

# %n will be replaced with the nodename.
CELERYD_LOG_FILE="/var/log/celery/%n.log"
CELERYD_PID_FILE="/var/run/celery/%n.pid"

# Workers should run as an unprivileged user.
CELERYD_USER="celery"
CELERYD_GROUP="celery"

# Name of the projects settings module.
export DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE="settings"

Example Django configuration Using Virtualenv

In case you are using virtualenv, you should add the path to your environment’s python interpreter:

# Name of nodes to start, here we have a single node
CELERYD_NODES="w1"
# or we could have three nodes:
#CELERYD_NODES="w1 w2 w3"

# Where to chdir at start.
CELERYD_CHDIR="/opt/Myproject/"

# Python interpreter from environment.
ENV_PYTHON="$CELERYD_CHDIR/env/bin/python"

# How to call "manage.py celeryd_multi"
CELERYD_MULTI="$ENV_PYTHON $CELERYD_CHDIR/manage.py celeryd_multi"

# How to call "manage.py celeryctl"
CELERYCTL="$ENV_PYTHON $CELERYD_CHDIR/manage.py celeryctl"

# Extra arguments to celeryd
CELERYD_OPTS="--time-limit=300 --concurrency=8"

# Name of the celery config module.
CELERY_CONFIG_MODULE="celeryconfig"

# %n will be replaced with the nodename.
CELERYD_LOG_FILE="/var/log/celery/%n.log"
CELERYD_PID_FILE="/var/run/celery/%n.pid"

# Workers should run as an unprivileged user.
CELERYD_USER="celery"
CELERYD_GROUP="celery"

# Name of the projects settings module.
export DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE="settings"

Available options

  • CELERYD_NODES

    Node names to start.

  • CELERYD_OPTS

    Additional arguments to celeryd, see celeryd –help for a list.

  • CELERYD_CHDIR

    Path to change directory to at start. Default is to stay in the current directory.

  • CELERYD_PID_FILE

    Full path to the PID file. Default is /var/run/celeryd%n.pid

  • CELERYD_LOG_FILE

    Full path to the celeryd log file. Default is /var/log/celeryd@%n.log

  • CELERYD_LOG_LEVEL

    Log level to use for celeryd. Default is INFO.

  • CELERYD_MULTI

    Path to the celeryd-multi program. Default is celeryd-multi. You can point this to a virtualenv, or even use manage.py for django.

  • CELERYCTL

    Path to the celeryctl program. Default is celeryctl. You can point this to a virtualenv, or even use manage.py for django.

  • CELERYD_USER

    User to run celeryd as. Default is current user.

  • CELERYD_GROUP

    Group to run celeryd as. Default is current user.

Init script: celerybeat

Usage:/etc/init.d/celerybeat {start|stop|restart}
Configuration file:
 /etc/default/celerybeat or /etc/default/celeryd

Example configuration

This is an example configuration for a Python project:

/etc/default/celerybeat:

# Where to chdir at start.
CELERYBEAT_CHDIR="/opt/Myproject/"

# Extra arguments to celerybeat
CELERYBEAT_OPTS="--schedule=/var/run/celerybeat-schedule"

# Name of the celery config module.#
CELERY_CONFIG_MODULE="celeryconfig"

Example Django configuration

This is an example configuration for those using django-celery

/etc/default/celerybeat:

# Where the Django project is.
CELERYBEAT_CHDIR="/opt/Project/"

# Name of the projects settings module.
export DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE="settings"

# Path to celerybeat
CELERYBEAT="/opt/Project/manage.py celerybeat"

# Extra arguments to celerybeat
CELERYBEAT_OPTS="--schedule=/var/run/celerybeat-schedule"

Available options

  • CELERYBEAT_OPTS

    Additional arguments to celerybeat, see celerybeat –help for a list.

  • CELERYBEAT_PIDFILE

    Full path to the PID file. Default is /var/run/celeryd.pid.

  • CELERYBEAT_LOGFILE

    Full path to the celeryd log file. Default is /var/log/celeryd.log

  • CELERYBEAT_LOG_LEVEL

    Log level to use for celeryd. Default is INFO.

  • CELERYBEAT

    Path to the celeryd program. Default is celeryd. You can point this to an virtualenv, or even use manage.py for django.

  • CELERYBEAT_USER

    User to run celeryd as. Default is current user.

  • CELERYBEAT_GROUP

    Group to run celeryd as. Default is current user.

Troubleshooting

If you can’t get the init scripts to work, you should try running them in verbose mode:

$ sh -x /etc/init.d/celeryd start

This can reveal hints as to why the service won’t start.

Also you will see the commands generated, so you can try to run the celeryd command manually to read the resulting error output.

For example my sh -x output does this:

++ start-stop-daemon --start --chdir /opt/Opal/release/opal --quiet \
    --oknodo --background --make-pidfile --pidfile /var/run/celeryd.pid \
    --exec /opt/Opal/release/opal/manage.py celeryd -- --time-limit=300 \
    -f /var/log/celeryd.log -l INFO

Run the celeryd command after –exec (without the ) to show the actual resulting output:

$ /opt/Opal/release/opal/manage.py celeryd --time-limit=300 \
    -f /var/log/celeryd.log -l INFO

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