How to Paginate Results in Elasticsearch: Syntax and Examples

To paginate results in Elasticsearch, use the from parameter to skip a number of results and the size parameter to limit how many results are returned. For example, from: 10 and size: 5 returns results 11 to 15. This helps you fetch results page by page.

Syntax

Pagination in Elasticsearch is controlled by two parameters in the search request:

• from: The number of results to skip before starting to return results.
• size: The number of results to return in the current page.

These parameters are used inside the JSON body of a search query or as URL parameters in a GET request.

json

{
  "from": 10,
  "size": 5,
  "query": {
    "match_all": {}
  }
}

Example

This example shows how to get the second page of results when each page has 5 items. It skips the first 5 results (from: 5) and returns the next 5 (size: 5).

json

{
  "from": 5,
  "size": 5,
  "query": {
    "match": {
      "title": "database"
    }
  }
}

Output

{
  "hits": {
    "total": {
      "value": 23,
      "relation": "eq"
    },
    "hits": [
      {"_id": "6", "_source": {"title": "Database Basics"}},
      {"_id": "7", "_source": {"title": "Advanced Database"}},
      {"_id": "8", "_source": {"title": "Database Optimization"}},
      {"_id": "9", "_source": {"title": "NoSQL Database"}},
      {"_id": "10", "_source": {"title": "Database Security"}}
    ]
  }
}

Common Pitfalls

Common mistakes when paginating in Elasticsearch include:

• Using very large from values, which can slow down queries because Elasticsearch still has to scan all skipped results.
• Not setting a size, which defaults to 10 and may not match your page size.
• Ignoring the search_after method for deep pagination, which is more efficient for large offsets.

For deep pagination, consider using search_after with a sort key instead of large from values.

json

{
  "from": 10000,
  "size": 10,
  "query": { "match_all": {} }
}

{
  "size": 10,
  "query": { "match_all": {} },
  "search_after": ["last_sort_value"],
  "sort": [ {"date": "asc"}, {"_id": "asc"} ]
}

Quick Reference

Parameter	Description	Example
from	Number of results to skip	from: 10
size	Number of results to return	size: 5
search_after	Value to continue after for deep pagination	search_after: ["last_sort_value"]
sort	Sort order required for search_after	sort: [{"date": "asc"}, {"_id": "asc"}]

Key Takeaways

Use from and size to paginate results by skipping and limiting hits.

Avoid large from values for deep pagination to prevent slow queries.

Use search_after with sorting for efficient deep pagination.

Always specify size to control page size explicitly.

Pagination parameters go inside the search query JSON body.