Important settings

For production workloads, make sure the Linux setting vm.max_map_count is set to at least 262144. On the OpenSearch Docker image, this setting is the default. To check, start a Bash session in the container and run:

  1. cat /proc/sys/vm/max_map_count

To increase this value, you have to modify the Docker image. For other install types, add this setting to the host machine’s /etc/sysctl.conf file with the following line:

  1. vm.max_map_count=262144

Then run sudo sysctl -p to reload.

The sample docker-compose.yml file also contains several key settings:

  • bootstrap.memory_lock=true

    Disbles swapping (along with memlock). Swapping can dramatically decrease performance and stability, so you should ensure it is disabled on production clusters.

  • OPENSEARCH_JAVA_OPTS=-Xms512m -Xmx512m

    Sets the size of the Java heap (we recommend half of system RAM).

  • nofile 65536

    Sets a limit of 65536 open files for the OpenSearch user.

  • port 9600

    Allows you to access Performance Analyzer on port 9600.