How to Access and Manage the Raw Access log in cPanel

How to Access and Manage the Raw Access log in cPanel?

How to Access and Manage the Raw Access log in cPanel?

By | April 27, 2025

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Raw access log is used to keep your HTTP web server records in text format. With this, you will get all the website information, like your monthly reports, from which sites and IPs are getting more requests, and which bot activities are taking place on the website.

Here is a sample of raw access from the cPanel:

Raw access image in text format

  1. Date and Time: Timestamp of the request.
  2. IP Address: Unique IP address for each visitor’s device.
  3. Request Method: Type of request made, for example the Post and Get method.
  4. Request URL: Particular page or resource requested.
  5. HTTP Status Code: Response code returned by the server for example 403 Forbidden and 404 Not Found.
  6. User Agent: Software or tool used to access the website like a browser or search engine bot.
  7. Referrer: Website that directs the visitor to your site if applicable.

With the above details, you will get some insight about raw access.


Benefits of viewing raw access.

  • Optimize the system log performance.
  • Manage and monitor the bandwidth resources
  • Check visitor/bot activity.

Steps to download the raw access

Step 1: Login to cPanel of the website.

Step 2: Search Raw access on search bar.

Search raw access on search bar

Step 3: Click on the domain to see the previous day logs alone.

Click on domain to see previous day logs

If want to see the current month of the log, under the ‘Archived raw log‘ option and click   domain option with SSL option to  download locally via notepad to view  it.

archived raw logs option

If you like to see each month logs on home directory at the end of each month, untick the box and make sure to click save option.

Untick and click save option

Understanding the Raw access log components.

If a visitor tries to access your website, their IP will be recorded in the form of a one-line text format for each request.

Each raw access entry contain web server information for your website, you need some technical knowledge to understand. Here is the breakdown of raw access for one request for below example.

Raw access example
[30/Apr/2019:12:31:16 -0500]: Date and time of the request with the time zone offset.
“GET / HTTP/1.1”: The request method (GET), requested resource (/), and HTTP version (1.1).
301: The HTTP status code indicates a permanent redirect mode.
0 : The size of the transferred data in bytes.
“-“: The referrer information is absent in this case.
Mozilla/5.0: The user agent string identifies the visitor’s browser and operating system details.