# Combining Fuzziness (Levenshtein distance) of multiple fields into one

**URL:** <https://discuss.elastic.co/t/combining-fuzziness-levenshtein-distance-of-multiple-fields-into-one/134245>\
**Category:** Elasticsearch\
**Created:** [June 1, 2018, 3:00pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/combining-fuzziness-levenshtein-distance-of-multiple-fields-into-one/134245 "2018-06-01T15:00:53Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![DavidEq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9bd4f/32.png) [@DavidEq](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/DavidEq)\
**Post date:** [June 1, 2018, 3:00pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/combining-fuzziness-levenshtein-distance-of-multiple-fields-into-one/134245/1 "2018-06-01T15:00:54Z")

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Hello,

I was googling and reading documentation for hours and still could not figure out...

**Below data exists**

"firstname" : "Michael",  
"lastname" : "Jackson"

**PROBLEM:**  
"query":"firstname:Michaelaa~ AND lastname:Jacksonaa~"  
This is a Levenshtein distance of a 2 for first name and 2 for last name. Combined it's a 4.

Is there a way I get only results returned for a combined Levenshtein distance of 2 or below of multiple fields?

**QUERY:**

GET mjc0601/\_search  
{  
"query":{  
"bool":{  
"must":[  
{  
"query\_string":{  
"query":"firstname:Michaelaa~ AND lastname:Jacksonaa~",  
"fuzzy\_prefix\_length":0,  
"fuzziness":2,  
"fuzzy\_transpositions": true,  
"fuzzy\_max\_expansions": 100  
}  
}  
]  
}  
}  
}

**Result:**

{  
"took": 3,  
"timed\_out": false,  
"\_shards": {  
"total": 5,  
"successful": 5,  
"skipped": 0,  
"failed": 0  
},  
"hits": {  
"total": 1,  
"max\_score": 0.9902103,  
"hits": [  
{  
"\_index": "mjc0601",  
"\_type": "person",  
"\_id": "\_HXZu2MBpzH4ZCxFqWkc",  
"\_score": 0.9902103,  
"\_source": {  
"firstname": "Michael",  
"lastname": "Jackson"  
}  
}  
]  
}  
}

**Expectation:**  
Not returning any results b/c combined fuzziness is a 4..

Thank you.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Mark\_Harwood](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/mark_harwood/32/10538_2.png) [@Mark\_Harwood](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Mark_Harwood)\
**Post date:** [June 8, 2018, 9:08am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/combining-fuzziness-levenshtein-distance-of-multiple-fields-into-one/134245/2 "2018-06-08T09:08:15Z")

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This is a per-term setting and for performance reasons [the max fuzziness value is 2](https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/current/common-options.html#fuzziness)

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/original/3X/1/a/1ac57faf039f6b580b3f104ef42a2a89e41014de.png) [@system](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/system)\
**Post date:** [July 6, 2018, 9:08am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/combining-fuzziness-levenshtein-distance-of-multiple-fields-into-one/134245/3 "2018-07-06T09:08:19Z")

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