# $now

Yields the current local date stamp when the message is processed.

This property belongs to the Time-Related System Properties group.

Name:

  $now

Category:

  Time-Related System Properties

Type:

  timestamp

## Description

Reports the local system date stamp (`YYYY-MM-DD`) at the moment rsyslog processes the message. The value is independent of the event payload and changes whenever the ruleset advances to the next message.

`$now` is always a little newer than `timegenerated` because rsyslog only evaluates it during processing, after the event has left the input queue. When queues back up, the gap between the two can grow from fractions of a second to minutes or hours.

## Usage

    template(name="example" type="list") {
        property(name="$now")
    }

## See also

See rsyslog Properties for the category overview.

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Contributing: Source & docs: rsyslog source project

© 2008–2025 Rainer Gerhards and others. Licensed under the Apache License 2.0.