# Upgrade to 5 file descriptors Issue

**URL:** <https://discuss.elastic.co/t/upgrade-to-5-file-descriptors-issue/64359>\
**Category:** Elasticsearch\
**Created:** [October 30, 2016, 1:48am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/upgrade-to-5-file-descriptors-issue/64359 "2016-10-30T01:48:39Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![ggp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/278dde/32.png) [@ggp](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/ggp)\
**Post date:** [October 30, 2016, 1:48am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/upgrade-to-5-file-descriptors-issue/64359/1 "2016-10-30T01:48:39Z")

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I am trying to upgrade _ **ES cluster to 5** _ and using **\_plugin/elasticsearch-migration/** when i am running cluster checkup and its complaining about issue **At least 65536 file descriptors must be available to Elasticsearch** first before i can upgrade, Here is what my node stats looks

when i call **\_nodes/stats/process?filter\_path=.max\_file\_descriptor** i see below value

> {"process":{"max\_file\_descriptors":-1}}}}

when i call **\_nodes/\_local?process=true&pretty=true** i see below value but not with process block

> "max\_file\_descriptors" : "65536"

below entries in /usr/share/elasticsearch/elasticsearch.sh

> MAX\_OPEN\_FILES=65536  
> MAX\_LOCKED\_MEMORY=unlimited

any idea what the issue is

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**Author:** ![mvg](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/mvg/32/98890_2.png) [@mvg](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/mvg)\
**Post date:** [October 31, 2016, 10:40am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/upgrade-to-5-file-descriptors-issue/64359/2 "2016-10-31T10:40:48Z")

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Maybe just one node is reporting -1 as max file descriptors? Can you introspect the response of the node info api for all nodes? (Either by sending `nodes/local?process=true` to all nodes or `nodes/stats/process` to s single node (this should include the max file descriptions for all nodes in your cluster) ).

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**Author:** ![ggp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/278dde/32.png) [@ggp](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/ggp)\
**Post date:** [October 31, 2016, 12:13pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/upgrade-to-5-file-descriptors-issue/64359/3 "2016-10-31T12:13:35Z")

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single node or cluster still it shows max\_file\_descriptor=-1,by the way it displays open files 65536 when i call ulimit -n, what options i have now to upgrade to 5 ?

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![mvg](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/mvg/32/98890_2.png) [@mvg](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/mvg)\
**Post date:** [October 31, 2016, 5:11pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/upgrade-to-5-file-descriptors-issue/64359/4 "2016-10-31T17:11:02Z")

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Not sure why this happens. But you can easily verify if this is problematic for ES 5. ES 5 checks for this at startup and fails if it doesn't have enough file descriptors. So if you just start a temporary ES 5 node on your machine (don't bind to localhost, that will enable dev mode) and if it starts without a problem then I think the warning that migration plugin is showing you, can be ignored.

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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:** [July 5, 2017, 10:08pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/upgrade-to-5-file-descriptors-issue/64359/5 "2017-07-05T22:08:09Z")

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