How to Check Failed Services

Prerequisites

Before checking failed services, make sure you have:

• SSH access to your VPS

Method 1: List All Failed Services

Connect to your VPS:

ssh hxroot@YOUR_SERVER_IP -p 22

systemctl --failed

Example output:

  UNIT          LOAD   ACTIVE SUB    DESCRIPTION
● nginx.service loaded failed failed nginx - high performance web server

Method 2: Check Status of a Specific Service

systemctl status nginx

Look for Active: failed or exit code.

Method 3: View Service Logs for Failure Reason

journalctl -u nginx -n 50 --no-pager

Look for error messages at the end.

Method 4: Check for Services That Failed on Boot

journalctl -b | grep "failed"

After Identifying a Failed Service

Restart the service:

sudo systemctl restart nginx

Check configuration syntax:

sudo nginx -t

View detailed error:

journalctl -xe -u nginx

Disable a permanently failing service:

sudo systemctl disable nginx

Check for Services That Failed to Start at Boot (But Are Not "Failed" Now)

systemctl list-units --state=failed

Automate Failed Service Alerts

#!/bin/bash
FAILED=$(systemctl --failed --no-legend)
if [ ! -z "$FAILED" ]; then
    echo "Failed services: $FAILED" | mail -s "Service Alert" admin@example.com
fi