# Discard empty/null values

**URL:** <https://discuss.elastic.co/t/discard-empty-null-values/376170>\
**Category:** Elasticsearch\
**Tags:** esql\
**Created:** [March 20, 2025, 9:37am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/discard-empty-null-values/376170 "2025-03-20T09:37:02Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![paddington1](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/paddington1/32/142154_2.png) [@paddington1](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/paddington1)\
**Post date:** [March 20, 2025, 9:37am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/discard-empty-null-values/376170/1 "2025-03-20T09:37:02Z")

</div>

Hi,

Is there a way to KEEP fields which are not null/empty with ES|QL?

I do not want to manually write KEEP for all of the fields which are not empty.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![dadoonet](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/dadoonet/32/137187_2.png) [@dadoonet](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/dadoonet)\
**Post date:** [March 20, 2025, 3:33pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/discard-empty-null-values/376170/2 "2025-03-20T15:33:06Z")

</div>

Apparently the only way is by using `drop_null_columns` query param. But it's not available within the query itself.

See [ES|QL query API | Elasticsearch Guide [8.17] | Elastic](https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/8.17/esql-query-api.html#esql-query-api-query-params)