# Why can't I access the index alias I created to use in Kibana Discover/Visualize? **URL:** \ **Category:** Kibana\ **Created:** [October 19, 2020, 6:15pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/why-cant-i-access-the-index-alias-i-created-to-use-in-kibana-discover-visualize/252591 "2020-10-19T18:15:24Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![bgiordano](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ba8739/32.png) [@bgiordano](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/bgiordano)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2020, 6:15pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/why-cant-i-access-the-index-alias-i-created-to-use-in-kibana-discover-visualize/252591/1 "2020-10-19T18:15:25Z")
What am I missing? Why can't I access an alias index by name from Kibana? I currently am using ES/K 7.6.2 I have been working with ES/K since 2014 --- used alias indices all the time. What has changed in 7.x that I am not understanding? I have a index - my\_main\_index (ex. 20 records ingested). I created an alias with a filter on my\_main\_index, called my\_alias\_index. From Dev Tools: 1. If I query on my\_alias\_index, the set of 10 records is returned, which is what I expect. 2. If I \_cat the alias index, the result shows the name my\_main\_index and the number of records as 20 - not what I expected. `GET _cat/indices/my_alias_index` From Management -\> Index Patterns: 1. If I try to "Create index pattern", I do not have access to the alias index name - only the main index name. So now I can't bring my\_alias\_index into Kibana and use it in Discover/Visualize, etc. ---
**Author:** ![bgiordano](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ba8739/32.png) [@bgiordano](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/bgiordano)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2020, 6:26pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/why-cant-i-access-the-index-alias-i-created-to-use-in-kibana-discover-visualize/252591/2 "2020-10-19T18:26:29Z")
OK - Finally see that aliases do exist but when you type the alias name in for "create index pattern", the main index name is displayed ("success") - so if I continue to create the index pattern in Kibana, and select "advanced", I can name using the alias name so that I can select it from the dropdown for Discover, Visualize, etc. Not the most obvious interaction and nothing seems to be mentioned in the create index pattern documentation regarding accessing an alias. Not happy that I can't list my alias indexes with GET \_cat/indices --- is there another way? ---
**Author:** ![bgiordano](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ba8739/32.png) [@bgiordano](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/bgiordano)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2020, 6:29pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/why-cant-i-access-the-index-alias-i-created-to-use-in-kibana-discover-visualize/252591/3 "2020-10-19T18:29:31Z")
Lastly, found GET \_cat/aliases/ to list the aliases. ---
**Author:** ![bhavyarm](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/bhavyarm/32/22392_2.png) [@bhavyarm](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/bhavyarm)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2020, 8:14pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/why-cant-i-access-the-index-alias-i-created-to-use-in-kibana-discover-visualize/252591/4 "2020-10-19T20:14:00Z")
Hello, Thanks for posting and looks like you figured it out. And yes documentation is definitely missing here from Kibana side. Here is an issue I logged for our kibana team - [https://github.com/elastic/kibana/issues/81063](https://github.com/elastic/kibana/issues/81063) Thanks, Bhavya ---
**Author:** ![bgiordano](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ba8739/32.png) [@bgiordano](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/bgiordano)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2020, 9:24pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/why-cant-i-access-the-index-alias-i-created-to-use-in-kibana-discover-visualize/252591/5 "2020-10-19T21:24:17Z")
Thank you! ---
**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/original/3X/1/a/1ac57faf039f6b580b3f104ef42a2a89e41014de.png) [@system](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/system)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2020, 9:24pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/why-cant-i-access-the-index-alias-i-created-to-use-in-kibana-discover-visualize/252591/6 "2020-11-16T21:24:24Z")
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