# Number of open shards exceeds cluster soft limit **URL:** \ **Category:** Elasticsearch\ **Created:** [June 20, 2019, 4:33am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/number-of-open-shards-exceeds-cluster-soft-limit/186582 "2019-06-20T04:33:23Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![amin.nugroho](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/amin.nugroho/32/41077_2.png) [@amin.nugroho](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/amin.nugroho)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2019, 4:33am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/number-of-open-shards-exceeds-cluster-soft-limit/186582/1 "2019-06-20T04:33:23Z")
I am currently using ES 6.6.1 (3 nodes), all running on centos 7. I am planning an upgrade to 6.8 and then 7.1 The upgrade assistent says this: Number of open shards exceeds cluster soft limit There are [3514] open shards in this cluster, but the cluster is limited to [1000] per data node, for [3000] maximum. The upgrade assistant links to this documentation which gives me 404 error upon opening it: [https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/master/breaking-changes-7.0.html#\_cluster\_wide\_shard\_soft\_limit](https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/master/breaking-changes-7.0.html#_cluster_wide_shard_soft_limit) How should I fix those on centos? Does this related to max open file in linux? Thanks ---
**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:** [June 20, 2019, 4:59am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/number-of-open-shards-exceeds-cluster-soft-limit/186582/2 "2019-06-20T04:59:18Z")
Take a look at [https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/7.1/misc-cluster.html#cluster-shard-limit](https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/7.1/misc-cluster.html#cluster-shard-limit), it should help. ---
**Author:** ![Christian\_Dahlqvist](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/christian_dahlqvist/32/4617_2.png) [@Christian\_Dahlqvist](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Christian_Dahlqvist)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2019, 5:03am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/number-of-open-shards-exceeds-cluster-soft-limit/186582/3 "2019-06-20T05:03:56Z")
The limit of 1000 shards per node is set quite high in my opinion, so as you are you are just about exceeding this you are oversharded, but not massively so. I would recommend trying to reduce the number of shards in the cluster. ---
**Author:** ![amin.nugroho](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/amin.nugroho/32/41077_2.png) [@amin.nugroho](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/amin.nugroho)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2019, 5:05am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/number-of-open-shards-exceeds-cluster-soft-limit/186582/4 "2019-06-20T05:05:41Z")
How do I reduce the number of shards? Adding more nodes? ---
**Author:** ![Christian\_Dahlqvist](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/christian_dahlqvist/32/4617_2.png) [@Christian\_Dahlqvist](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Christian_Dahlqvist)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2019, 5:19am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/number-of-open-shards-exceeds-cluster-soft-limit/186582/5 "2019-06-20T05:19:28Z")
What is your use case? If you are using time based indices you can try to reduce the number of primary shards for new indices or switch from daily to weekly or monthly indices if volumes are low and retention periods long. ---
**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/original/3X/1/a/1ac57faf039f6b580b3f104ef42a2a89e41014de.png) [@system](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/system)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2019, 5:19am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/number-of-open-shards-exceeds-cluster-soft-limit/186582/6 "2019-07-18T05:19:31Z")
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