Important: This documentation is about an older version. It's relevant only to the release noted, many of the features and functions have been updated or replaced. Please view the current version.
Tempo provides various command-line flags to configure its behavior when starting the binary. This document serves as a reference for these flags.
Global flags
Flag
Description
Default
--version
Print this build’s version information and exit
false
--mem-ballast-size-mbs
Size of memory ballast to allocate in MBs
0
--mutex-profile-fraction
Override default mutex profiling fraction
0
--block-profile-threshold
Override default block profiling threshold
0
--config.file
Configuration file to load
--config.expand-env
Whether to expand environment variables in config file
false
--config.verify
Verify configuration and exit
false
Target flag
Flag
Description
Default
--target
Target module to run
all
Authentication and multitenancy
Flag
Description
Default
--auth.enabled
Set to true to enable auth (deprecated: use multitenancy.enabled)
false
--multitenancy.enabled
Set to true to enable multitenancy
false
HTTP and API settings
Flag
Description
Default
--http-api-prefix
String prefix for all HTTP API endpoints
""
--enable-go-runtime-metrics
Set to true to enable all Go runtime metrics
false
--shutdown-delay
How long to wait between SIGTERM and shutdown
0
Server settings
Flag
Description
Default
--server.http-listen-port
HTTP server listen port
80
--server.grpc-listen-port
gRPC server listen port
9095
Memberlist settings
Flag
Description
Default
--memberlist.host-port
Host port to connect to memberlist cluster
--memberlist.bind-port
Port for memberlist to communicate on
7946
--memberlist.message-history-buffer-bytes
Size in bytes for the message history buffer
0
Module configuration
You can use additional flags to configuring individual Tempo modules, such as the distributor, ingester, querier, and their components. These flags follow a pattern like --<module>.<setting> and are extensively documented in the configuration file format.
Use the configuration file approach described in the Configuration documentation.
The documentation has a comprehensive list of all configuration options.
Usage examples
Start Tempo with a configuration file:
bash
tempo --config.file=/etc/tempo/config.yaml
Start Tempo with a specific target:
bash
tempo --target=distributor --config.file=/etc/tempo/config.yaml
Verify configuration without starting Tempo:
bash
tempo --config.file=/etc/tempo/config.yaml --config.verify