# UNION-style search requests? **URL:** \ **Category:** Elasticsearch\ **Created:** [October 19, 2011, 9:07am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/union-style-search-requests/5639 "2011-10-19T09:07:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Andrew\_Regan](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/andrew_regan/32/3080_2.png) [@Andrew\_Regan](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Andrew_Regan)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2011, 9:07am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/union-style-search-requests/5639/1 "2011-10-19T09:07:36Z")
Is it possible to perform multiple, nested search queries (as per BoolQueryBuilder), each nested query run against a potentially different set of indices? Like a UNION in SQL: "return all hits where property=X in (indexA,indexB) OR property=Y in (indexA,indexC)". This used to be possible with Compass, but indices are specified at the request- rather than the query level in ElasticSearch. I'd have to run each search clause individually and UNION them up myself, which feels like a bad idea. Is there a better way to do this using ES? (I should probably add that, though my indices represent different data domains - so I can't replace them with one index and multiple types (unless you disagree?) - they do have common properties so that they can be searched together.) ---
**Author:** ![kimchy](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/kimchy/32/44952_2.png) [@kimchy](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/kimchy)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2011, 9:04pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/union-style-search-requests/5639/2 "2011-10-19T21:04:45Z")
You can't do that in elasticsearch, but, we can introduce a new "index" element in the query DSL, that will act as match\_all if not executing on the listed indices, and use the internal query if it does. On Wed, Oct 19, 2011 at 11:07 AM, Andrew Regan [aregan@gmail.com](mailto:aregan@gmail.com) wrote: > Is it possible to perform multiple, nested search queries (as per > BoolQueryBuilder), each nested query run against a potentially different set > of indices? Like a UNION in SQL: "return all hits where property=X in > (indexA,indexB) OR property=Y in (indexA,indexC)". > > This used to be possible with Compass, but indices are specified at the > request- rather than the query level in Elasticsearch. I'd have to run each > search clause individually and UNION them up myself, which feels like a bad > idea. > > Is there a better way to do this using ES? > > (I should probably add that, though my indices represent different data > domains - so I can't replace them with one index and multiple types (unless > you disagree?) - they do have common properties so that they can be searched > together.) ---
**Author:** ![Andrew\_Regan](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/andrew_regan/32/3080_2.png) [@Andrew\_Regan](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Andrew_Regan)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2011, 4:25pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/union-style-search-requests/5639/3 "2011-10-20T16:25:21Z")
Thanks, Shay. Re, the 'we', is that something I can do myself, or would it need a new plugin, perhaps? ---
**Author:** ![kimchy](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/kimchy/32/44952_2.png) [@kimchy](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/kimchy)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2011, 12:51am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/union-style-search-requests/5639/4 "2011-10-21T00:51:55Z")
First you can open an issue :). It should be a built in query in elasticsearch, so it can either be the royal we, and I can implement it (should be simple), or the "commons" we, where I can help you implement it 🙂 On Thu, Oct 20, 2011 at 6:25 PM, Andrew Regan [aregan@gmail.com](mailto:aregan@gmail.com) wrote: > Thanks, Shay. Re, the 'we', is that something I can do myself, or would it > need a new plugin, perhaps? ---
**Author:** ![Andrew\_Regan](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/andrew_regan/32/3080_2.png) [@Andrew\_Regan](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Andrew_Regan)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2011, 2:11pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/union-style-search-requests/5639/5 "2011-10-21T14:11:50Z")
OK, great. Have raised [https://github.com/elasticsearch/elasticsearch/issues/1416](https://github.com/elasticsearch/elasticsearch/issues/1416). Happy to help, and to test, though not an expert on the ES internals. ---
**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/original/3X/1/a/1ac57faf039f6b580b3f104ef42a2a89e41014de.png) [@system](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/system)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2017, 3:51am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/union-style-search-requests/5639/6 "2017-07-06T03:51:12Z")