# Does GC at snapshot affect performance? can users force GC?

**URL:** <https://discuss.elastic.co/t/does-gc-at-snapshot-affect-performance-can-users-force-gc/152374>\
**Category:** Elasticsearch\
**Created:** [October 14, 2018, 6:54am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/does-gc-at-snapshot-affect-performance-can-users-force-gc/152374 "2018-10-14T06:54:25Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Jianzhou\_Z](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/jianzhou_z/32/46751_2.png) [@Jianzhou\_Z](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Jianzhou_Z)\
**Post date:** [October 14, 2018, 6:54am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/does-gc-at-snapshot-affect-performance-can-users-force-gc/152374/1 "2018-10-14T06:54:25Z")

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I observed that during snapshots, systems run GC.

Here are some example GC logs that happened during snapshots.

Node 1:

```auto
[2018-10-14T06:01:56,133][INFO][o.e.m.j.JvmGcMonitorService] [n1] [gc][1121610] overhead, spent [257ms] collecting in the last [1s]
[2018-10-14T06:02:09,020][WARN][o.e.m.j.JvmGcMonitorService] [n1] [gc][old][1121612][216] duration [11.3s], collections [1]/[11.8s], total [11.3s]/[4.4m], memory [18.5gb]->[8.3gb]/[29.8gb], all_pools {[young] [795.3mb]->[221.8mb]/
[1.4gb]}{[survivor] [118.7mb]->[0b]/[191.3mb]}{[old] [17.6gb]->[8gb]/[28.1gb]}
[2018-10-14T06:02:09,020][WARN][o.e.m.j.JvmGcMonitorService] [n1] [gc][1121612] overhead, spent [11.5s] collecting in the last [11.8s]

[2018-10-14T06:06:22,978][INFO][o.e.m.j.JvmGcMonitorService] [n1] [gc][1121865] overhead, spent [312ms] collecting in the last [1s]
[2018-10-14T06:06:23,978][INFO][o.e.m.j.JvmGcMonitorService] [n1] [gc][1121866] overhead, spent [463ms] collecting in the last [1.2s]
[2018-10-14T06:06:25,090][INFO][o.e.m.j.JvmGcMonitorService] [n1] [gc][1121867] overhead, spent [313ms] collecting in the last [1.1s]
[2018-10-14T06:06:26,102][INFO][o.e.m.j.JvmGcMonitorService] [n1] [gc][1121868] overhead, spent [343ms] collecting in the last [1s]

[2018-10-14T06:06:51,282][INFO][o.e.m.j.JvmGcMonitorService] [n1] [gc][1121893] overhead, spent [367ms] collecting in the last [1s]
[2018-10-14T06:06:53,283][INFO][o.e.m.j.JvmGcMonitorService] [n1] [gc][1121895] overhead, spent [256ms] collecting in the last [1s]
[2018-10-14T06:07:06,347][INFO][o.e.m.j.JvmGcMonitorService] [n1] [gc][1121908] overhead, spent [255ms] collecting in the last [1s]
[2018-10-14T06:07:07,410][INFO][o.e.m.j.JvmGcMonitorService] [n1] [gc][1121909] overhead, spent [282ms] collecting in the last [1s]
[2018-10-14T06:07:10,583][INFO][o.e.m.j.JvmGcMonitorService] [n1] [gc][1121912] overhead, spent [348ms] collecting in the last [1.1s]

```

Node 2:

```auto
[2018-10-14T06:06:16,697][INFO][o.e.m.j.JvmGcMonitorService] [n2] [gc][old][19089995][4491] duration [7s], collections [1]/[8.4s], total [7s]/[1h], memory [18.5gb]->[9.9gb]/[29.8gb], all_pools {[young] [738.3mb]->[66mb]/[1.4gb]}{[
survivor] [149.9mb]->[0b]/[191.3mb]}{[old] [17.6gb]->[9.8gb]/[28.1gb]}
[2018-10-14T06:06:16,699][WARN][o.e.m.j.JvmGcMonitorService] [n2] [gc][19089995] overhead, spent [7.4s] collecting in the last [8.4s]
[2018-10-14T06:06:25,703][INFO][o.e.m.j.JvmGcMonitorService] [n2] [gc][19090004] overhead, spent [281ms] collecting in the last [1s]
[2018-10-14T06:06:26,706][INFO][o.e.m.j.JvmGcMonitorService] [n2] [gc][19090005] overhead, spent [254ms] collecting in the last [1s]

2018-10-14T06:07:07,981][INFO][o.e.m.j.JvmGcMonitorService] [n2] [gc][19090046] overhead, spent [277ms] collecting in the last [1s]
[2018-10-14T06:07:09,981][INFO][o.e.m.j.JvmGcMonitorService] [n2] [gc][19090048] overhead, spent [299ms] collecting in the last [1s]
[2018-10-14T06:07:22,186][INFO][o.e.m.j.JvmGcMonitorService] [n2] [gc][19090060] overhead, spent [294ms] collecting in the last [1s]

```

We can see that old GCs happened. What I found is that if a node did old GCs before a snapshot, it survives old GC an gets many non-old GC after the snapshot time...

Can this affect the system performance? and is there a way to tune system to not GC during creating snapshot? For example, can we force a node run old GC before snapshot?

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<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:** [November 11, 2018, 6:54am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/does-gc-at-snapshot-affect-performance-can-users-force-gc/152374/2 "2018-11-11T06:54:34Z")

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