+++
title = "Elasticsearch"
availability = "v2.5+"
maintainer = "Community"
category = "Data & Storage"
description = "Scale applications based on 'elasticsearch search template query' or 'elasticsearch query' result."
go_file = "elasticsearch_scaler"
+++

### Trigger Specification

This specification describes the `elasticsearch` trigger that scales based on result of an [elasticsearch search template](https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/current/search-template.html) query or [elasticsearch query](https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/current/query-dsl.html).

The trigger always requires the following information, but requires either only searchTemplateName **or** only query:

```yaml
triggers:
  - type: elasticsearch
    metadata:
      addresses: "http://localhost:9200"
      username: "elastic"
      passwordFromEnv: "ELASTIC_PASSWORD"
      index: "my-index"
      searchTemplateName: "my-search-template-name"
      query: "my-query"
      parameters: "param1:value1;param2:value2"
      valueLocation: "hits.total.value"
      targetValue: "1.1"
      activationTargetValue: "5.5"
```

**Parameter list:**

- `addresses` - Comma separated list of hosts and ports of the Elasticsearch cluster client nodes.
- `username` - Username to authenticate with to Elasticsearch cluster.
- `passwordFromEnv` - Environment variable to read the authentication password from to authenticate with the Elasticsearch cluster.
- `index` - Index to run the search template query on. It supports multiple indexes separated by a semicolon character ( `;` ).
- `searchTemplateName` - The search template name to run.
- `query` - The query to run.
- `targetValue` - Target value to scale on. When the metric provided by the API is equal or higher to this value, KEDA will start scaling out. When the metric is 0 or less, KEDA will scale down to 0. (This value can be a float)
- `activationTargetValue` - Target value for activating the scaler. Learn more about activation [here](./../concepts/scaling-deployments.md#activating-and-scaling-thresholds).(Default: `0`, Optional, This value can be a float)
- `parameters` - Parameters that will be used by the search template. It supports multiple params separated by a semicolon character ( `;` ).
- `valueLocation` - [GJSON path notation](https://github.com/tidwall/gjson#path-syntax) to refer to the field in the payload containing the metric value.
- `unsafeSsl` - Skip certificate validation when connecting over HTTPS. (Values: `true`, `false`, Default: `false`, Optional)

### Authentication Parameters

You can authenticate by using a username/password or apiKey/cloudID if you're using using ElasticSearch on Elastic Cloud.

**Password Authentication:**

- `username` - Username to authenticate with to Elasticsearch cluster.
- `password` - Password for configured user to login to Elasticsearch cluster.

**Cloud ID and API Key Authentication:**

[Cloud ID](https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/cloud/current/ec-cloud-id.html) and API Key can be used for Elastic Cloud Service.

- `cloudID` - CloudID to connect with ElasticSearch on Elastic Cloud.
- `apiKey` - API key to authenticate with ElasticSearch on Elastic Cloud.

### Examples

Here is an example of how to deploy a scaled object with the `elasticsearch` scale trigger which uses the search template and `TriggerAuthentication`.

```yaml
apiVersion: v1
kind: Secret
metadata:
  name: elasticsearch-secrets
type: Opaque
data:
  password: cGFzc3cwcmQh
---
apiVersion: keda.sh/v1alpha1
kind: TriggerAuthentication
metadata:
  name: keda-trigger-auth-elasticsearch-secret
spec:
  secretTargetRef:
  - parameter: password
    name: elasticsearch-secrets
    key: password
---
apiVersion: keda.sh/v1alpha1
kind: ScaledObject
metadata:
  name: elasticsearch-scaledobject
spec:
  scaleTargetRef:
    name: "deployment-name"
  triggers:
    - type: elasticsearch
      metadata:
        addresses: "http://localhost:9200"
        username: "elastic"
        index: "my-index"
        searchTemplateName: "my-search-template"
        valueLocation: "hits.total.value"
        targetValue: "10"
        parameters: "dummy_value:1"
      authenticationRef:
        name: keda-trigger-auth-elasticsearch-secret
```
Here is an example of how to deploy a scaled object with the `elasticsearch` scale trigger which uses `query`. In this example the transactions will be count that the application has to process based on APM.

```yaml
apiVersion: v1
kind: Secret
metadata:
  name: elasticsearch-secrets
type: Opaque
data:
  password: cGFzc3cwcmQh
---
apiVersion: keda.sh/v1alpha1
kind: TriggerAuthentication
metadata:
  name: keda-trigger-auth-elasticsearch-secret
spec:
  secretTargetRef:
  - parameter: password
    name: elasticsearch-secrets
    key: password
---
apiVersion: keda.sh/v1alpha1
kind: ScaledObject
metadata:
  name: elasticsearch-scaledobject
spec:
  scaleTargetRef:
    name: "deployment-name"
  triggers:
    - type: elasticsearch
      metadata:
        addresses: "http://localhost:9200"
        username: "elastic"
        index: "my-index"
        query: |
          {
            "size": 0,
            "query": {
              "bool": {
                "must": [
                  {
                    "term": {
                      "service.name": "my-application" }
                  },
                  {
                    "term": {
                      "service.environment": "production" }
                  },
                  {
                    "range": {
                      "@timestamp": {
                        "gte": "now-2m",
                        "lte": "now-1m"
                      }
                    }
                  }
                ]
              }
            },
            "aggs": {
              "transaction_count": {
                "cardinality": {
                  "field": "transaction.id" }
              }
            }
          }
        valueLocation: "aggregations.transaction_count.value"
        targetValue: "1000"
      authenticationRef:
        name: keda-trigger-auth-elasticsearch-secret
```