---
title: Use Cloudflare Trace
description: Learn how to use Cloudflare Trace in the dashboard and with the API.
image: https://developers.cloudflare.com/core-services-preview.png
---

> Documentation Index  
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://developers.cloudflare.com/rules/llms.txt  
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

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# Use Cloudflare Trace

## Use Trace in the dashboard

### 1\. Configure one or more Cloudflare products

1. Log in to the [Cloudflare dashboard ↗](https://dash.cloudflare.com), and select your account.
2. Set configuration settings at the account level, or select a domain and configure settings for one or more Cloudflare products.

### 2\. Build a trace

1. In the Cloudflare dashboard, go to the **Trace** page.  
[ Go to **Trace** ](https://dash.cloudflare.com/?to=/:account/trace)
2. Enter a URL to trace. The URL must include a hostname that belongs to your account.
3. Select an HTTP method. If you select _POST_, _PUT_, or _PATCH_, you should enter a value in **Request Body**.
4. (Optional) Define any custom request properties to simulate the conditions of a specific HTTP/S request. You can customize the following request properties:  
   * **Protocol** (HTTP protocol version)  
   * **User Agent and Request Headers**  
   * **Cookies**  
   * **Geolocation** (request source [country](https://developers.cloudflare.com/ruleset-engine/rules-language/fields/reference/ip.src.country/), [region](https://developers.cloudflare.com/ruleset-engine/rules-language/fields/reference/ip.src.region/), and [city](https://developers.cloudflare.com/ruleset-engine/rules-language/fields/reference/ip.src.city/))  
   * [**Bot Score**](https://developers.cloudflare.com/bots/concepts/bot-score/)  
   * **Request Body** (for `POST`, `PUT`, and `PATCH` requests)  
   * **Skip Challenge** (skips a Cloudflare-issued [challenge](https://developers.cloudflare.com/cloudflare-challenges/), if any, allowing the trace to continue)
5. Select **Send Trace**.

### 3\. Assess results

The **Trace results** page shows all evaluated and executed configurations from different Cloudflare products, in evaluation order. Any inactive rules are not evaluated.

1. Analyze the different [steps](#steps-in-trace-results) with evaluated and executed configurations for the current trace. Trace results include matches for all active rules and configurations, whether configured at the account level or for a specific domain or subdomain.  
To show all configurations, including the ones that did not match the request, select _All configurations_ in the **Results shown** dropdown.
2. (Optional) Update your Cloudflare configuration (at the account or at the domain/subdomain level) and create a new trace to check the impact of your changes.

### 4\. (Optional) Save the trace configuration

To run a trace later with the same configuration:

1. Copy the JSON shown in the dashboard with the current trace configuration.
2. When creating a new trace, paste it in the JSON box to define all the settings of the new trace.

## Use Trace via API

Use the [Request Trace](https://developers.cloudflare.com/api/resources/request%5Ftracers/subresources/traces/methods/create/) operation to perform a trace using the Cloudflare API.

---

## Steps in trace results

* Execution of one or more rules of Cloudflare products built on the [Ruleset Engine](https://developers.cloudflare.com/ruleset-engine/). Refer to the Ruleset Engine's [Phases list](https://developers.cloudflare.com/ruleset-engine/reference/phases-list/) for a list of such products.
* [Page Rules](https://developers.cloudflare.com/rules/page-rules/): Execution of one or more rules.
* [Workers](https://developers.cloudflare.com/workers/): Execution of one or more scripts.

```json
{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/directory/","name":"Directory"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/rules/","name":"Rules"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"/rules/trace-request/","name":"Trace a request"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":4,"item":{"@id":"/rules/trace-request/how-to/","name":"Use Cloudflare Trace"}}]}
```