> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.bronto.io/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Amazon CloudFront Real-Time Logs

> Stream Amazon CloudFront real-time logs to Bronto with per-viewer-request edge details such as cache status, edge location, viewer IP, and response bytes.

Amazon CloudFront can emit logs in two distinct shapes: **real-time logs** (per-request details including cache status, edge location, URI, status code, and time to first byte, streamed within seconds) and **standard access logs** (a similar shape with delayed batch delivery — minutes to hours). Standard logging is available in two versions: **v1** delivers to S3 only, while **v2** also supports CloudWatch Logs and Kinesis Data Firehose as destinations.

## Recommended method

[**Kinesis Firehose**](./aws-firehose) — real-time logs deliver to a Kinesis Data Stream, which Firehose then forwards to Bronto. This is the only path that preserves the low-latency stream.

<Warning>
  CloudFront real-time log records arrive **TAB-delimited and positional** (fields in the fixed order configured in the real-time log configuration; unselected fields rendered as `-`). Bronto stores them raw but does **not** extract fields automatically. Build a [custom parser](/core-features/custom-parser) that splits on tab and maps columns to your configured field list, in order. See [Formats requiring a custom parser](./aws-firehose#formats-requiring-a-custom-parser).
</Warning>

## Alternatives

* [**S3 Log Forwarder**](./aws-client-s3) — for **standard access logs** (v1, or v2 routed to S3). Different schema and delayed delivery; not equivalent to real-time logs.
* [**CloudWatch Log Forwarder**](./aws-client-cloudwatch) — for standard access logs (v2) routed to a CloudWatch Log Group.

See [Ingesting AWS Data into Bronto](./aws-overview) for the full service-to-method mapping.

## References

* [Amazon CloudFront — real-time logs](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonCloudFront/latest/DeveloperGuide/real-time-logs.html)