Create or update an index template Added in 7.9.0

PUT /_index_template/{name}
Api key auth

Index templates define settings, mappings, and aliases that can be applied automatically to new indices.

Elasticsearch applies templates to new indices based on an wildcard pattern that matches the index name. Index templates are applied during data stream or index creation. For data streams, these settings and mappings are applied when the stream's backing indices are created. Settings and mappings specified in a create index API request override any settings or mappings specified in an index template. Changes to index templates do not affect existing indices, including the existing backing indices of a data stream.

You can use C-style /* *\/ block comments in index templates. You can include comments anywhere in the request body, except before the opening curly bracket.

Multiple matching templates

If multiple index templates match the name of a new index or data stream, the template with the highest priority is used.

Multiple templates with overlapping index patterns at the same priority are not allowed and an error will be thrown when attempting to create a template matching an existing index template at identical priorities.

Composing aliases, mappings, and settings

When multiple component templates are specified in the composed_of field for an index template, they are merged in the order specified, meaning that later component templates override earlier component templates. Any mappings, settings, or aliases from the parent index template are merged in next. Finally, any configuration on the index request itself is merged. Mapping definitions are merged recursively, which means that later mapping components can introduce new field mappings and update the mapping configuration. If a field mapping is already contained in an earlier component, its definition will be completely overwritten by the later one. This recursive merging strategy applies not only to field mappings, but also root options like dynamic_templates and meta. If an earlier component contains a dynamic_templates block, then by default new dynamic_templates entries are appended onto the end. If an entry already exists with the same key, then it is overwritten by the new definition.

Path parameters

  • name string Required

    Index or template name

Query parameters

  • create boolean

    If true, this request cannot replace or update existing index templates.

  • master_timeout string

    Period to wait for a connection to the master node. If no response is received before the timeout expires, the request fails and returns an error.

  • cause string

    User defined reason for creating/updating the index template

application/json

Body Required

  • index_patterns string | array[string]
  • composed_of array[string]

    An ordered list of component template names. Component templates are merged in the order specified, meaning that the last component template specified has the highest precedence.

  • template object
    Hide template attributes Show template attributes object
    • aliases object

      Aliases to add. If the index template includes a data_stream object, these are data stream aliases. Otherwise, these are index aliases. Data stream aliases ignore the index_routing, routing, and search_routing options.

      Hide aliases attribute Show aliases attribute object
    • mappings object
      Hide mappings attributes Show mappings attributes object
    • settings object Additional properties
      Hide settings attributes Show settings attributes object
      • index object Additional properties
      • mode string

      • routing_path string | array[string]

        One of:
        string-1 string array-2 array[string]
      • soft_deletes object
        Hide soft_deletes attributes Show soft_deletes attributes object
        • enabled boolean

          Indicates whether soft deletes are enabled on the index.

        • retention_lease object
          Hide retention_lease attribute Show retention_lease attribute object
          • period string Required

            A duration. Units can be nanos, micros, ms (milliseconds), s (seconds), m (minutes), h (hours) and d (days). Also accepts "0" without a unit and "-1" to indicate an unspecified value.

      • sort object
        Hide sort attributes Show sort attributes object
      • number_of_routing_shards number
      • check_on_startup string

        Values are true, false, or checksum.

      • codec string

      • routing_partition_size number | string

        Some APIs will return values such as numbers also as a string (notably epoch timestamps). This behavior is used to capture this behavior while keeping the semantics of the field type.

        Depending on the target language, code generators can keep the union or remove it and leniently parse strings to the target type.

        One of:
        _spec_utils:Stringifiedinteger number _spec_utils:Stringifiedinteger string
      • load_fixed_bitset_filters_eagerly boolean

      • hidden boolean | string

        One of:
        boolean-1 boolean string-2 string

      • auto_expand_replicas string | null

        One of:
        string-1 string _spec_utils:NullValue string | null

        A null value that is to be interpreted as an actual value, unless other uses of null that are equivalent to a missing value. It is used for exemple in settings, where using the NullValue for a setting will reset it to its default value.

      • merge object
        Hide merge attribute Show merge attribute object
      • search object
        Hide search attributes Show search attributes object
        • idle object
          Hide idle attribute Show idle attribute object
          • after string

            A duration. Units can be nanos, micros, ms (milliseconds), s (seconds), m (minutes), h (hours) and d (days). Also accepts "0" without a unit and "-1" to indicate an unspecified value.

        • slowlog object
          Hide slowlog attributes Show slowlog attributes object
          • level string
          • source number
          • reformat boolean
          • threshold object
            Hide threshold attributes Show threshold attributes object
            • query object
              Hide query attributes Show query attributes object
              • warn string

                A duration. Units can be nanos, micros, ms (milliseconds), s (seconds), m (minutes), h (hours) and d (days). Also accepts "0" without a unit and "-1" to indicate an unspecified value.

              • info string

                A duration. Units can be nanos, micros, ms (milliseconds), s (seconds), m (minutes), h (hours) and d (days). Also accepts "0" without a unit and "-1" to indicate an unspecified value.

              • debug string

                A duration. Units can be nanos, micros, ms (milliseconds), s (seconds), m (minutes), h (hours) and d (days). Also accepts "0" without a unit and "-1" to indicate an unspecified value.

              • trace string

                A duration. Units can be nanos, micros, ms (milliseconds), s (seconds), m (minutes), h (hours) and d (days). Also accepts "0" without a unit and "-1" to indicate an unspecified value.

            • fetch object
              Hide fetch attributes Show fetch attributes object
              • warn string

                A duration. Units can be nanos, micros, ms (milliseconds), s (seconds), m (minutes), h (hours) and d (days). Also accepts "0" without a unit and "-1" to indicate an unspecified value.

              • info string

                A duration. Units can be nanos, micros, ms (milliseconds), s (seconds), m (minutes), h (hours) and d (days). Also accepts "0" without a unit and "-1" to indicate an unspecified value.

              • debug string

                A duration. Units can be nanos, micros, ms (milliseconds), s (seconds), m (minutes), h (hours) and d (days). Also accepts "0" without a unit and "-1" to indicate an unspecified value.

              • trace string

                A duration. Units can be nanos, micros, ms (milliseconds), s (seconds), m (minutes), h (hours) and d (days). Also accepts "0" without a unit and "-1" to indicate an unspecified value.

      • refresh_interval string

        A duration. Units can be nanos, micros, ms (milliseconds), s (seconds), m (minutes), h (hours) and d (days). Also accepts "0" without a unit and "-1" to indicate an unspecified value.

      • max_result_window number
      • max_inner_result_window number
      • max_rescore_window number
      • max_docvalue_fields_search number
      • max_script_fields number
      • max_ngram_diff number
      • max_shingle_diff number
      • blocks object
        Hide blocks attributes Show blocks attributes object
      • max_refresh_listeners number
      • analyze object
        Hide analyze attribute Show analyze attribute object
      • highlight object
        Hide highlight attribute Show highlight attribute object
      • max_terms_count number
      • max_regex_length number
      • routing object
        Hide routing attributes Show routing attributes object
      • gc_deletes string

        A duration. Units can be nanos, micros, ms (milliseconds), s (seconds), m (minutes), h (hours) and d (days). Also accepts "0" without a unit and "-1" to indicate an unspecified value.

      • default_pipeline string
      • final_pipeline string
      • lifecycle object
        Hide lifecycle attributes Show lifecycle attributes object
        • name string

        • indexing_complete boolean | string

          Some APIs will return values such as numbers also as a string (notably epoch timestamps). This behavior is used to capture this behavior while keeping the semantics of the field type.

          Depending on the target language, code generators can keep the union or remove it and leniently parse strings to the target type.

          One of:
          _spec_utils:Stringifiedboolean boolean _spec_utils:Stringifiedboolean string
        • origination_date number

          If specified, this is the timestamp used to calculate the index age for its phase transitions. Use this setting if you create a new index that contains old data and want to use the original creation date to calculate the index age. Specified as a Unix epoch value in milliseconds.

        • parse_origination_date boolean

          Set to true to parse the origination date from the index name. This origination date is used to calculate the index age for its phase transitions. The index name must match the pattern .*-{date_format}-\d+, where the date_format is yyyy.MM.dd and the trailing digits are optional. An index that was rolled over would normally match the full format, for example logs-2016.10.31-000002). If the index name doesn’t match the pattern, index creation fails.

        • step object
          Hide step attribute Show step attribute object
          • wait_time_threshold string

            A duration. Units can be nanos, micros, ms (milliseconds), s (seconds), m (minutes), h (hours) and d (days). Also accepts "0" without a unit and "-1" to indicate an unspecified value.

        • rollover_alias string

          The index alias to update when the index rolls over. Specify when using a policy that contains a rollover action. When the index rolls over, the alias is updated to reflect that the index is no longer the write index. For more information about rolling indices, see Rollover.

        • prefer_ilm boolean | string

          Preference for the system that manages a data stream backing index (preferring ILM when both ILM and DLM are applicable for an index).

          One of:
          boolean-1 boolean string-2 string
      • provided_name string

      • creation_date number | string

        Some APIs will return values such as numbers also as a string (notably epoch timestamps). This behavior is used to capture this behavior while keeping the semantics of the field type.

        Depending on the target language, code generators can keep the union or remove it and leniently parse strings to the target type.

        One of:
        _types:UnitMillis number _spec_utils:StringifiedEpochTimeUnitMillis string

        Time unit for milliseconds

      • creation_date_string string | number

        A date and time, either as a string whose format can depend on the context (defaulting to ISO 8601), or a number of milliseconds since the Epoch. Elasticsearch accepts both as input, but will generally output a string representation.

        One of:
        _types:DateTime string _types:UnitMillis number

        Time unit for milliseconds

      • uuid string
      • version object
        Hide version attributes Show version attributes object

      • verified_before_close boolean | string

        One of:
        boolean-1 boolean string-2 string

      • format string | number

        One of:
        string-1 string number-2 number
      • max_slices_per_scroll number
      • translog object
        Hide translog attributes Show translog attributes object
      • query_string object
        Hide query_string attribute Show query_string attribute object

      • priority number | string

        One of:
        number-1 number string-2 string
      • top_metrics_max_size number
      • analysis object
        Hide analysis attributes Show analysis attributes object
      • settings object Additional properties
      • time_series object
        Hide time_series attributes Show time_series attributes object
      • queries object
        Hide queries attribute Show queries attribute object
        • cache object
          Hide cache attribute Show cache attribute object
      • similarity object

        Configure custom similarity settings to customize how search results are scored.

      • mapping object
        Hide mapping attributes Show mapping attributes object
        • coerce boolean
        • total_fields object
          Hide total_fields attributes Show total_fields attributes object

          • limit number | string

            The maximum number of fields in an index. Field and object mappings, as well as field aliases count towards this limit. The limit is in place to prevent mappings and searches from becoming too large. Higher values can lead to performance degradations and memory issues, especially in clusters with a high load or few resources.

            One of:
            number-1 number string-2 string

          • ignore_dynamic_beyond_limit boolean | string

            This setting determines what happens when a dynamically mapped field would exceed the total fields limit. When set to false (the default), the index request of the document that tries to add a dynamic field to the mapping will fail with the message Limit of total fields [X] has been exceeded. When set to true, the index request will not fail. Instead, fields that would exceed the limit are not added to the mapping, similar to dynamic: false. The fields that were not added to the mapping will be added to the _ignored field.

            One of:
            boolean-1 boolean string-2 string
        • depth object
          Hide depth attribute Show depth attribute object
          • limit number

            The maximum depth for a field, which is measured as the number of inner objects. For instance, if all fields are defined at the root object level, then the depth is 1. If there is one object mapping, then the depth is 2, etc.

        • nested_fields object
          Hide nested_fields attribute Show nested_fields attribute object
          • limit number

            The maximum number of distinct nested mappings in an index. The nested type should only be used in special cases, when arrays of objects need to be queried independently of each other. To safeguard against poorly designed mappings, this setting limits the number of unique nested types per index.

        • nested_objects object
          Hide nested_objects attribute Show nested_objects attribute object
          • limit number

            The maximum number of nested JSON objects that a single document can contain across all nested types. This limit helps to prevent out of memory errors when a document contains too many nested objects.

        • field_name_length object
          Hide field_name_length attribute Show field_name_length attribute object
          • limit number

            Setting for the maximum length of a field name. This setting isn’t really something that addresses mappings explosion but might still be useful if you want to limit the field length. It usually shouldn’t be necessary to set this setting. The default is okay unless a user starts to add a huge number of fields with really long names. Default is Long.MAX_VALUE (no limit).

        • dimension_fields object
          Hide dimension_fields attribute Show dimension_fields attribute object
          • limit number

            [preview] This functionality is in technical preview and may be changed or removed in a future release. Elastic will work to fix any issues, but features in technical preview are not subject to the support SLA of official GA features.

        • source object
          Hide source attribute Show source attribute object
          • mode string Required

            Values are disabled, stored, or synthetic.

        • ignore_malformed boolean | string

          One of:
          boolean-1 boolean string-2 string
      • indexing.slowlog object
        Hide indexing.slowlog attributes Show indexing.slowlog attributes object
        • level string
        • source number
        • reformat boolean
        • threshold object
          Hide threshold attribute Show threshold attribute object
          • index object
            Hide index attributes Show index attributes object
            • warn string

              A duration. Units can be nanos, micros, ms (milliseconds), s (seconds), m (minutes), h (hours) and d (days). Also accepts "0" without a unit and "-1" to indicate an unspecified value.

            • info string

              A duration. Units can be nanos, micros, ms (milliseconds), s (seconds), m (minutes), h (hours) and d (days). Also accepts "0" without a unit and "-1" to indicate an unspecified value.

            • debug string

              A duration. Units can be nanos, micros, ms (milliseconds), s (seconds), m (minutes), h (hours) and d (days). Also accepts "0" without a unit and "-1" to indicate an unspecified value.

            • trace string

              A duration. Units can be nanos, micros, ms (milliseconds), s (seconds), m (minutes), h (hours) and d (days). Also accepts "0" without a unit and "-1" to indicate an unspecified value.

      • indexing_pressure object
        Hide indexing_pressure attribute Show indexing_pressure attribute object
        • memory object Required
          Hide memory attribute Show memory attribute object
          • limit number

            Number of outstanding bytes that may be consumed by indexing requests. When this limit is reached or exceeded, the node will reject new coordinating and primary operations. When replica operations consume 1.5x this limit, the node will reject new replica operations. Defaults to 10% of the heap.

      • store object
        Hide store attributes Show store attributes object

        • type string Required

          Any of:
          _types:StorageType string _types:StorageType string

          Values are fs, niofs, mmapfs, or hybridfs.

        • allow_mmap boolean

          You can restrict the use of the mmapfs and the related hybridfs store type via the setting node.store.allow_mmap. This is a boolean setting indicating whether or not memory-mapping is allowed. The default is to allow it. This setting is useful, for example, if you are in an environment where you can not control the ability to create a lot of memory maps so you need disable the ability to use memory-mapping.

    • lifecycle object
      Hide lifecycle attributes Show lifecycle attributes object
      • data_retention string

        A duration. Units can be nanos, micros, ms (milliseconds), s (seconds), m (minutes), h (hours) and d (days). Also accepts "0" without a unit and "-1" to indicate an unspecified value.

      • downsampling object
        Hide downsampling attribute Show downsampling attribute object
        • rounds array[object] Required

          The list of downsampling rounds to execute as part of this downsampling configuration

          Hide rounds attributes Show rounds attributes object
          • after string Required

            A duration. Units can be nanos, micros, ms (milliseconds), s (seconds), m (minutes), h (hours) and d (days). Also accepts "0" without a unit and "-1" to indicate an unspecified value.

          • config object Required
            Hide config attribute Show config attribute object
            • fixed_interval string Required

              A date histogram interval. Similar to Duration with additional units: w (week), M (month), q (quarter) and y (year)

      • enabled boolean

        If defined, it turns data stream lifecycle on/off (true/false) for this data stream. A data stream lifecycle that's disabled (enabled: false) will have no effect on the data stream.

  • data_stream object
    Hide data_stream attributes Show data_stream attributes object
  • priority number

    Priority to determine index template precedence when a new data stream or index is created. The index template with the highest priority is chosen. If no priority is specified the template is treated as though it is of priority 0 (lowest priority). This number is not automatically generated by Elasticsearch.

  • version number
  • _meta object
    Hide _meta attribute Show _meta attribute object
    • * object Additional properties
  • allow_auto_create boolean

    This setting overrides the value of the action.auto_create_index cluster setting. If set to true in a template, then indices can be automatically created using that template even if auto-creation of indices is disabled via actions.auto_create_index. If set to false, then indices or data streams matching the template must always be explicitly created, and may never be automatically created.

  • ignore_missing_component_templates array[string]

    The configuration option ignore_missing_component_templates can be used when an index template references a component template that might not exist

  • deprecated boolean

    Marks this index template as deprecated. When creating or updating a non-deprecated index template that uses deprecated components, Elasticsearch will emit a deprecation warning.

Responses

  • 200 application/json
    Hide response attribute Show response attribute object
    • acknowledged boolean Required

      For a successful response, this value is always true. On failure, an exception is returned instead.
PUT /_index_template/{name} 
curl \
 --request PUT 'http://api.example.com/_index_template/{name}' \
 --header "Authorization: $API_KEY" \
 --header "Content-Type: application/json" \
 --data '"{\n  \"index_patterns\" : [\"template*\"],\n  \"priority\" : 1,\n  \"template\": {\n    \"settings\" : {\n      \"number_of_shards\" : 2\n    }\n  }\n}"'
Request examples 
{
  "index_patterns" : ["template*"],
  "priority" : 1,
  "template": {
    "settings" : {
      "number_of_shards" : 2
    }
  }
}
You can include index aliases in an index template. During index creation, the `{index}` placeholder in the alias name will be replaced with the actual index name that the template gets applied to. 
{
  "index_patterns": [
    "template*"
  ],
  "template": {
    "settings": {
      "number_of_shards": 1
    },
    "aliases": {
      "alias1": {},
      "alias2": {
        "filter": {
          "term": {
            "user.id": "kimchy"
          }
        },
        "routing": "shard-1"
      },
      "{index}-alias": {}
    }
  }
}