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How to Configure Android Logcat Filters and Log Levels for Kotlin

Learn Android Studio Logcat query syntax for Kotlin apps, choose severity thresholds, and filter terminal output by tag with adb logcat.

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To narrow Android logs while developing a Kotlin app, use Android Studio’s Logcat query field for interactive filters such as package, tag, message, and severity. Use adb logcat when you want a terminal filter based on tag and minimum priority. The two interfaces use different syntax, so do not interchange their expressions.

Open Logcat in Android Studio

  1. Build and run your app on an emulator or physical device.
  2. In Android Studio, select View > Tool Windows > Logcat.
  3. Enter a query in the Logcat query field. The window displays app and system logs in real time and can show an exception with its stack trace.

Use Ctrl+Space in the query field to see query suggestions. Query history and favorite filters can help when you repeat an investigation. See Android Studio’s Logcat documentation for the documented query behavior.

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Filter by app, tag, message, or severity

Android Studio’s Logcat query language uses named fields and values. These examples can be entered directly in the query field:

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Query What it shows
package:mine Logs from packages belonging to the open project.
tag:MyTag level:DEBUG Entries for the specified tag at DEBUG or higher severity.
message~:timeout Entries whose message matches the regular expression timeout.
-tag:Noise Entries whose tag does not match the supplied text.
(tag:foo | level:ERROR) & package:mine Project-package entries matching either the tag condition or the error-level condition.
is:crash or is:stacktrace Crash-like entries or stack-trace entries.

Other documented query fields include process and age. Negation and regular-expression matching are supported for tag, package, message, and line.

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Understand how query terms combine

By default, multiple positive terms with the same key are combined with OR; terms with different keys are combined with AND. Use explicit operators and parentheses when the intended grouping should be clear. In the combined example above, & requires the entry to belong to the open project, while | accepts either of the other conditions.

Choose a severity threshold

A level: query is a minimum-severity threshold, not an exact-level match. For example, level:WARN includes WARN, ERROR, and ASSERT entries; level:ERROR narrows that to ERROR and ASSERT. The available query levels are VERBOSE, DEBUG, INFO, WARN, ERROR, and ASSERT, and their names are case-insensitive. Android Developers describes the rule this way: “The level query matches against the log level of the Logcat message, where the log entry level is greater or equal to the query level.”

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Filter logs from a terminal with adb

Use tag-priority specifications when filtering from a terminal. The general form is adb logcat [option] ... [filter-spec] ...; the device-side equivalent is adb shell logcat .... A filter specification pairs a tag with a minimum priority.

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adb logcat MyApp:D '*:S'

This shows entries from the MyApp tag at DEBUG or higher and silences other tags. Quote *:S in shells where the asterisk would otherwise be expanded as a wildcard. To show warnings and more severe entries across tags, use:

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adb logcat *:W

For adb, the priority letters are V (verbose), D (debug), I (info), W (warning), E (error), F (fatal), and S (silent). Android Studio’s level: query instead uses named levels, so a query such as level:WARN is not an adb filter specification. Consult the Android logcat command-line documentation for command options.

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Use Logcat with Kotlin diagnostic logging

Kotlin code can write diagnostic messages with android.util.Log. Android’s debugging guide also shows how to log an exception with its throwable so Logcat can include the stack trace. For example:

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import android.util.Log

try {
    // Code being investigated
} catch (exception: Exception) {
    Log.e("MyApp", "Operation failed", exception)
}

Choose a stable tag, such as MyApp, that you can use in your Logcat or adb filter. During development, a DEBUG flag and conditional statements can keep diagnostic calls limited to debug builds. Remove debug log messages and stack-trace print calls before publishing. See Android’s app debugging guide.

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When expected logs do not appear

  • Check that the app is running on the device or emulator currently selected in Android Studio.
  • Clear or broaden the active query; a query can hide entries even when they are present in the underlying logs.
  • Check whether compile-time settings removed the logging call or whether system properties or application filtering set a minimum severity.
  • Remember that Android logging uses circular buffers, including main, system, and crash. The main buffer stores most application logs, while the other buffers serve their respective categories.
  • For options specific to the connected device, run adb logcat --help.

Which filter should you use?

Interface Syntax Best suited to
Android Studio Logcat Key-value queries such as package:mine level:WARN Interactive filtering by app, tag, message, age, crash, or stack trace.
adb logcat Tag-priority expressions such as MyApp:D *:S Terminal filtering and concise tag allowlists.

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