# How to setup 2 Node Cluster
**URL:** https://discuss.elastic.co/t/how-to-setup-2-node-cluster/255937
**Category:** Elasticsearch
**Created:** [November 19, 2020, 7:28am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/how-to-setup-2-node-cluster/255937 "2020-11-19T07:28:57Z")
**Posts on this page:** 6
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@azeiner](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/azeiner)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2020, 7:28am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/how-to-setup-2-node-cluster/255937/1 "2020-11-19T07:28:57Z")
Hi everybody, i've got a question concerning a project we're doing currently where the customer is only willing to use his existing 2 VM's for an Elastic cluster which concerns me a little bit - normally we use 3+ nodes for a cluster but 2 nodes? We are using it for testresults which are only needed for a year or so but my question is, how to setup a 2 node cluster on two machines then? One Master and one Data Node with daily snapshots? The thing is that, from what i understand, a two node cluster ist not for failover in case one node fails but just usable as a redundancy for the indices - right? Maybe someone has a clue about how to run such a system setup? Thanx in advance! Greetings Andy
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### Author:  [@dadoonet](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/dadoonet)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2020, 7:47am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/how-to-setup-2-node-cluster/255937/2 "2020-11-19T07:47:00Z")
That's going against the best practices.
It means that if one node fails or there's a network disconnection, the cluster will be blocked or you will suffer from a split brain.
See
> **[Quorum-based decision making | Elasticsearch Guide \[7.10\] | Elastic](https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/7.10/modules-discovery-quorums.html)**
> To be sure that the cluster remains available you **must not stop half or more of the nodes in the voting configuration at the same time**. As long as more than half of the voting nodes are available the cluster can still work normally.
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### Author:  [@azeiner](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/azeiner)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2020, 8:08am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/how-to-setup-2-node-cluster/255937/3 "2020-11-19T08:08:15Z")
Thank you David for your fast response, i totally agree and the thing is ... am i right to say that there is no benefit from 2 nodes an in this case we should stick to one node and doing snapshots? We really tried hard to convince the customer for a 3 node cluster ... but no way ... really, really strange ...
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### Author:  [@Christian\_Dahlqvist](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Christian_Dahlqvist)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2020, 8:08am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/how-to-setup-2-node-cluster/255937/4 "2020-11-19T08:08:51Z")
Have a look at [this section in the docs](https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/7.10/high-availability-cluster-small-clusters.html).
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### Author:  [@azeiner](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/azeiner)
#### Post date: [November 19, 2020, 8:20am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/how-to-setup-2-node-cluster/255937/5 "2020-11-19T08:20:03Z")
That's it, thank you Christian, i definitly missed this document. Thanks for your reply! Kind regards Andy
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### Author:  [@system](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/system)
#### Post date: [December 17, 2020, 8:20am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/how-to-setup-2-node-cluster/255937/6 "2020-12-17T08:20:06Z")
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