PM2 is a daemon process manager that will help you manage and keep your application online. Getting started with PM2 is straightforward, it is offered as a simple and intuitive CLI, installable via NPM.

Installation

The latest PM2 version is installable with NPM or Yarn:

npm install pm2@latest -g
# or
yarn global add pm2

To install Node.js and NPM you can use NVM

Start an app

The simplest way to start, daemonize and monitor your application is by using this command line:

pm2 start app.js

Or start any other application easily:

pm2 start bashscript.sh
pm2 start python-app.py --watch
pm2 start binary-file -- --port 1520

Some options you can pass to the CLI:

# Specify an app name
--name <app_name>

# Watch and Restart app when files change
--watch

# Set memory threshold for app reload
--max-memory-restart <200MB>

# Specify log file
--log <log_path>

# Pass extra arguments to the script
-- arg1 arg2 arg3

# Delay between automatic restarts
--restart-delay <delay in ms>

# Prefix logs with time
--time

# Do not auto restart app
--no-autorestart

# Specify cron for forced restart
--cron <cron_pattern>

# Attach to application log
--no-daemon

As you can see many options are available to manage your application with PM2. You will discover them depending on your use case.

Managing processes

Managing application state is simple here are the commands:

pm2 restart app_name
pm2 reload app_name
pm2 stop app_name
pm2 delete app_name

Instead of app_name you can pass:

• all to act on all processes
• id to act on a specific process id

Check status, logs, metrics

Now that you have started this application, you can check its status, logs, metrics and even get the online dashboard with pm2.io.

List managed applications

List managed applications

pm2 [list|ls|status]

Display logs

To display logs in realtime:

pm2 logs

To dig in older logs:

pm2 logs --lines 200

Terminal Based Dashboard

Here is a realtime dashboard that fits directly into your terminal:

pm2 monit

pm2.io: Monitoring & Diagnostic Web Interface

Web based dashboard, cross servers with diagnostic system:

pm2 plus

Sources: Quick Start | PM2.IO Web App