Supervisord cheatsheet

supervisorctl

Command	Description
`supervisorctl status`	Status of all programs
`supervisorctl status myapp`	Status of one program
`supervisorctl start myapp`	Start a program
`supervisorctl stop myapp`	Stop a program
`supervisorctl restart myapp`	Restart a program
`supervisorctl start all`	Start every program
`supervisorctl tail -f myapp`	Follow stdout log
`supervisorctl tail myapp stderr`	View stderr log
`supervisorctl reread`	Reload config files from disk
`supervisorctl update`	Apply config changes (add/remove programs)

Daemon control

Command	Description
`supervisord -c /etc/supervisor/supervisord.conf`	Start daemon with config
`supervisorctl shutdown`	Stop supervisord and all children
`systemctl status supervisor`	Check service (when managed by systemd)
`ps aux \| grep supervisord`	Confirm daemon is running

Config file locations

Path	Description
`/etc/supervisor/supervisord.conf`	Main config (Debian/Ubuntu)
`/etc/supervisor/conf.d/*.conf`	Per-app program configs
`/var/log/supervisor/`	Default supervisord log directory
`/var/run/supervisor.sock`	Default RPC unix socket

Example program config

# /etc/supervisor/conf.d/myapp.conf
[program:myapp]
command=/opt/myapp/venv/bin/gunicorn -w 4 app:app
directory=/opt/myapp
user=deploy
autostart=true
autorestart=unexpected
stdout_logfile=/var/log/supervisor/myapp.log
stderr_logfile=/var/log/supervisor/myapp.err
environment=PATH="/opt/myapp/venv/bin",DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE="app.settings"

Example group config

[group:workers]
programs=celery-worker,celery-beat

# Control the group:
# supervisorctl start workers:*

Pro tips

After editing config: supervisorctl reread then update
Use absolute paths in command= — supervisord has a minimal PATH
autorestart=unexpected avoids restart loops on intentional exits
For new deployments on Linux, consider a systemd unit instead

Practice scenarios

Hands-on Supervisord scenarios on live Linux VMs: supervisord