# Filter out documents before indexing in Elasticsearch based on certain condition

**URL:** <https://discuss.elastic.co/t/filter-out-documents-before-indexing-in-elasticsearch-based-on-certain-condition/139772>\
**Category:** Elasticsearch\
**Created:** [July 12, 2018, 1:56pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/filter-out-documents-before-indexing-in-elasticsearch-based-on-certain-condition/139772 "2018-07-12T13:56:34Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Ali\_Nazemian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e9a140/32.png) [@Ali\_Nazemian](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Ali_Nazemian)\
**Post date:** [July 12, 2018, 1:56pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/filter-out-documents-before-indexing-in-elasticsearch-based-on-certain-condition/139772/1 "2018-07-12T13:56:34Z")

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I was wondering if I could filter our documents before indexing in Elasticsearch based on specific condition. For example, let's say I would like to drop a document from being index if field1="something". Is this something I can address via using out of the box processors in Elasticsearch and use "ingest node" to cover it? Can I write a custom processor if it doesn't exist?

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**Author:** ![cbuescher](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/cbuescher/32/60402_2.png) [@cbuescher](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/cbuescher)\
**Post date:** [July 20, 2018, 9:32am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/filter-out-documents-before-indexing-in-elasticsearch-based-on-certain-condition/139772/2 "2018-07-20T09:32:49Z")

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Doing this kind of "dropping" documents based on conditions as part of ingest was previously suggested but [dismissed here](https://github.com/elastic/elasticsearch/issues/30173). I'm not sure if I personally follow the argument but haven't looked into the implications either, but for the time being it seems this is something you have to do in your pre-processing pipeline (e.g. Logstash or your custom process).

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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:** [August 17, 2018, 9:32am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/filter-out-documents-before-indexing-in-elasticsearch-based-on-certain-condition/139772/3 "2018-08-17T09:32:51Z")

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