# Compression in ElasticSearch

**URL:** <https://discuss.elastic.co/t/compression-in-elasticsearch/41793>\
**Category:** Elasticsearch\
**Created:** [February 15, 2016, 1:59pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/compression-in-elasticsearch/41793 "2016-02-15T13:59:41Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 7\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![lucifer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ad7895/32.png) [@lucifer](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/lucifer)\
**Post date:** [February 15, 2016, 1:59pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/compression-in-elasticsearch/41793/1 "2016-02-15T13:59:41Z")

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Does ElasticSearch compress the logs? Suppose I supply a few hundred gigabytes of logs, how much space will the elastic search take in total, including the indices and the original documents?

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**Author:** ![warkolm](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/warkolm/32/39224_2.png) [@warkolm](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/warkolm)\
**Post date:** [February 15, 2016, 3:55pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/compression-in-elasticsearch/41793/2 "2016-02-15T15:55:54Z")

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Which logs?  
It does compress the indices, see [https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/2.2/index-modules.html#\_static\_index\_settings](https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/2.2/index-modules.html#_static_index_settings)

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**Author:** ![lucifer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ad7895/32.png) [@lucifer](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/lucifer)\
**Post date:** [February 16, 2016, 4:45am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/compression-in-elasticsearch/41793/3 "2016-02-16T04:45:03Z")

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Suppose I want to use elasticsearch for log indexing and the size of my logs is 11TB roughly. How much server space will I require for elasticsearch, for both, the indices and the original documents?

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**Author:** ![nik9000](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/nik9000/32/44947_2.png) [@nik9000](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/nik9000)\
**Post date:** [February 16, 2016, 5:12am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/compression-in-elasticsearch/41793/4 "2016-02-16T05:12:53Z")

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About 11TB. The logs are compressed but the indexes that it uses to make  
searching them quick tend to take up roughly the same amount of space as  
you get from compression. Roughly. You are better off indexing a  
representative sample and seeing what size you see.

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**Author:** ![lucifer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ad7895/32.png) [@lucifer](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/lucifer)\
**Post date:** [February 16, 2016, 5:21am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/compression-in-elasticsearch/41793/5 "2016-02-16T05:21:00Z")

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I am currently using the default settings if elasticsearch. What are the ways in which I can reduce the size taken by elasticsearch without much compromising with the speed with which it searches the logs?

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**Author:** ![lucifer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ad7895/32.png) [@lucifer](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/lucifer)\
**Post date:** [February 16, 2016, 7:25am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/compression-in-elasticsearch/41793/6 "2016-02-16T07:25:12Z")

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And what type of servers are preferred? the one with fixed storage or variable storage with I/O costs?

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**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/original/3X/1/a/1ac57faf039f6b580b3f104ef42a2a89e41014de.png) [@system](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/system)\
**Post date:** [July 5, 2017, 11:16pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/compression-in-elasticsearch/41793/7 "2017-07-05T23:16:06Z")

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