= Elasticsearch

Elasticsearch is the distributed, RESTful search and analytics engine at the heart of the https://www.elastic.co/products[Elastic Stack]. You can use Elasticsearch to store, search, and manage data for:

• Logs
• Metrics
• A search backend
• Application monitoring
• Endpoint security

... and more!

To learn more about Elasticsearch's features and capabilities, see our https://www.elastic.co/products/elasticsearch[product page].

[[get-started]] == Get started

The simplest way to set up Elasticsearch is to create a managed deployment with https://www.elastic.co/cloud/as-a-service[Elasticsearch Service on Elastic Cloud].

If you prefer to install and manage Elasticsearch yourself, you can download the latest version from https://www.elastic.co/downloads/elasticsearch[elastic.co/downloads/elasticsearch].

For more installation options, see the https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/current/install-elasticsearch.html[Elasticsearch installation documentation].

[[upgrade]] == Upgrade

To upgrade from an earlier version of Elasticsearch, see the https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/current/setup-upgrade.html[Elasticsearch upgrade documentation].

[[build-source]] == Build from source

Elasticsearch uses https://gradle.org[Gradle] for its build system.

To build a distribution for your local OS and print its output location upon completion, run:

./gradlew localDistro

To build a distribution for another platform, run the related command:

./gradlew :distribution:archives:linux-tar:assemble ./gradlew :distribution:archives:darwin-tar:assemble ./gradlew :distribution:archives:windows-zip:assemble

To build distributions for all supported platforms, run:

./gradlew assemble

Distributions are output to distributions/archives.

To run the test suite, see xref:TESTING.asciidoc[TESTING].

[[docs]] == Documentation

For the complete Elasticsearch documentation visit https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/current/index.html[elastic.co].

For information about our documentation processes, see the xref:docs/README.asciidoc[docs README].

[[contribute]] == Contribute

For contribution guidelines, see xref:CONTRIBUTING.md[CONTRIBUTING].

[[questions]] == Questions? Problems? Suggestions?

• To report a bug or request a feature, create a https://github.com/elastic/elasticsearch/issues/new/choose[GitHub Issue]. Please ensure someone else hasn't created an issue for the same topic.

• Need help using Elasticsearch? Reach out on the https://discuss.elastic.co[Elastic Forum] or https://ela.st/slack[Slack]. A fellow community member or Elastic engineer will be happy to help you out.