A search request can be executed purely using a URI by providing request parameters. Not all search options are exposed when executing a search using this mode, but it can be handy for quick “curl tests”. Here is an example:

$ curl -XGET 'http://localhost:9200/twitter/tweet/_search?q=user:kimchy'

And here is a sample response:

{
    "_shards":{
        "total" : 5,
        "successful" : 5,
        "failed" : 0
    },
    "hits":{
        "total" : 1,
        "hits" : [
            {
                "_index" : "twitter",
                "_type" : "tweet",
                "_id" : "1", 
                "_source" : {
                    "user" : "kimchy",
                    "postDate" : "2009-11-15T14:12:12",
                    "message" : "trying out Elastic Search"
                }
            }
        ]
    }
}

Parameters

The parameters allowed in the URI are:

Name	Description
q	The query string (maps to the `query_string` query).
df	The default field to use when no field prefix is defined within the query.
analyzer	The analyzer name to be used when analyzing the query string.
default_operator	The default operator to be used, can be `AND` or `OR`. Defaults to `OR`.
explain	For each hit, contain an explanation of how scoring of the hits was computed.
fields	The selective fields of the document to return for each hit (either retried from the index if stored, or from the `_source` if not), comma delimited. Defaults to the internal `_source` field. Not specifying any value will cause no fields to return.
sort	Sorting to perform. Can either be in the form of `fieldName`, or `fieldName:asc`/`fieldName:desc`. The fieldName can either be an actual field within the document, or the special `_score` name to indicate sorting based on scores. There can be several `sort` parameters (order is important).
track_scores	When sorting, set to `true` in order to still track scores and return them as part of each hit.
timeout	A search timeout, bounding the search request to be executed within the specified time value and bail with the hits accumulated up to that point when expired. Defaults to no timeout.
from	The starting from index of the hits to return. Defaults to `0`.
size	The number of hits to return. Defaults to `10`.
search_type	The type of the search operation to perform. Can be `dfs_query_then_fetch`, `dfs_query_and_fetch`, `query_then_fetch`, `query_and_fetch`. Defaults to `query_then_fetch`.
lowercase_expanded_terms	Should terms be automatically lowercased or not. Defaults to `true`.
analyze_wildcard	Should wildcard and prefix queries be analyzed or not. Defaults to `false`.

elasticsearch. guide

Search API - URI Request

Guide

API

Search

Parameters