Configure the Kibana endpointedit

This documentation refers to configuring the standalone (legacy) APM Server. This method of running APM Server will be deprecated and removed in a future release. Please consider upgrading to Fleet and the APM integration.

Configuring the Kibana endpoint is required for APM Agent configuration in Kibana. You configure the endpoint in the apm-server.kibana section of the apm-server.yml config file.

Here’s a sample configuration:

apm-server.kibana.enabled: true
apm-server.kibana.host: "http://localhost:5601"

Considerationsedit

  • If your setup uses a secret token for Agent/Server communication, the same token is used to secure this endpoint.
  • It’s important to still set relevant defaults locally in each Agent’s configuration. If APM Server is unreachable, slow to respond, returns an error, etc., defaults set in the agent will apply according to their precedence.
  • APM Server needs sufficient Kibana privileges to manage central configuration. See Create a central config user for a list of required privileges.

Kibana endpoint configuration optionsedit

You can specify the following options in the apm-server.kibana section of the apm-server.yml config file:

apm-server.kibana.enablededit

Defaults to false. Must be true to use APM Agent configuration.

apm-server.kibana.hostedit

The Kibana host that APM Server will communicate with. The default is 127.0.0.1:5601. The value of host can be a URL or IP:PORT. For example: http://192.15.3.2, 192:15.3.2:5601 or http://192.15.3.2:6701/path. If no port is specified, 5601 is used.

When a node is defined as an IP:PORT, the scheme and path are taken from the apm-server.kibana.protocol and apm-server.kibana.path config options.

IPv6 addresses must be defined using the following format: https://[2001:db8::1]:5601.

apm-server.kibana.protocoledit

The name of the protocol Kibana is reachable on. The options are: http or https. The default is http. However, if you specify a URL for host, the value of protocol is overridden by whatever scheme you specify in the URL.

Example config:

apm-server.kibana.host: "192.0.2.255:5601"
apm-server.kibana.protocol: "http"
apm-server.kibana.path: /kibana
apm-server.kibana.usernameedit

The basic authentication username for connecting to Kibana.

apm-server.kibana.passwordedit

The basic authentication password for connecting to Kibana.

apm-server.kibana.pathedit

An HTTP path prefix that is prepended to the HTTP API calls. This is useful for the cases where Kibana listens behind an HTTP reverse proxy that exports the API under a custom prefix.

apm-server.kibana.ssl.enablededit

Enables APM Server to use SSL settings when connecting to Kibana via HTTPS. If you configure APM Server to connect over HTTPS, this setting defaults to true and APM Server uses the default SSL settings.

Example configuration:

apm-server.kibana.host: "https://192.0.2.255:5601"
apm-server.kibana.ssl.enabled: true
apm-server.kibana.ssl.certificate_authorities: ["/etc/pki/root/ca.pem"]
apm-server.kibana.ssl.certificate: "/etc/pki/client/cert.pem"
apm-server.kibana.ssl.key: "/etc/pki/client/cert.key"

For information on the additional SSL configuration options, see SSL output settings.

Agent Config configuration optionsedit

You can specify the following options in the apm-server.agent.config section of the apm-server.yml config file:

agent.config.cache.expirationedit

When using APM Agent configuration, information fetched from Kibana will be cached in memory. This setting specifies the time before cache key expiration. Defaults to 30 seconds.