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Elasticsearch Reference [7.0] » Search APIs » Explain API
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Explain API

The explain api computes a score explanation for a query and a specific document. This can give useful feedback whether a document matches or didn’t match a specific query.

Note that a single index must be provided to the index parameter.

Usage

Full query example:

GET /twitter/_explain/0
{
      "query" : {
        "match" : { "message" : "elasticsearch" }
      }
}

This will yield the following result:

{
   "_index":"twitter",
   "_type":"_doc",
   "_id":"0",
   "matched":true,
   "explanation":{
      "value":1.6943597,
      "description":"weight(message:elasticsearch in 0) [PerFieldSimilarity], result of:",
      "details":[
         {
            "value":1.6943597,
            "description":"score(freq=1.0), product of:",
            "details":[
               {
                  "value":2.2,
                  "description":"boost",
                  "details":[]
               },
               {
                  "value":1.3862944,
                  "description":"idf, computed as log(1 + (N - n + 0.5) / (n + 0.5)) from:",
                  "details":[
                     {
                        "value":1,
                        "description":"n, number of documents containing term",
                        "details":[]
                     },
                     {
                        "value":5,
                        "description":"N, total number of documents with field",
                        "details":[]
                     }
                  ]
               },
               {
                  "value":0.5555555,
                  "description":"tf, computed as freq / (freq + k1 * (1 - b + b * dl / avgdl)) from:",
                  "details":[
                     {
                        "value":1.0,
                        "description":"freq, occurrences of term within document",
                        "details":[]
                     },
                     {
                        "value":1.2,
                        "description":"k1, term saturation parameter",
                        "details":[]
                     },
                     {
                        "value":0.75,
                        "description":"b, length normalization parameter",
                        "details":[]
                     },
                     {
                        "value":3.0,
                        "description":"dl, length of field",
                        "details":[]
                     },
                     {
                        "value":5.4,
                        "description":"avgdl, average length of field",
                        "details":[]
                     }
                  ]
               }
            ]
         }
      ]
   }
}

There is also a simpler way of specifying the query via the q parameter. The specified q parameter value is then parsed as if the query_string query was used. Example usage of the q parameter in the explain api:

GET /twitter/_explain/0?q=message:search

This will yield the same result as the previous request.

All parameters:

_source

Set to true to retrieve the _source of the document explained. You can also retrieve part of the document by using _source_includes & _source_excludes (see Get API for more details)

stored_fields

Allows to control which stored fields to return as part of the document explained.

routing

Controls the routing in the case the routing was used during indexing.

parent

Same effect as setting the routing parameter.

preference

Controls on which shard the explain is executed.

source

Allows the data of the request to be put in the query string of the url.

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. Defaults to the default search analyzer.

analyze_wildcard

Should wildcard and prefix queries be analyzed or not. Defaults to false.

lenient

If set to true will cause format based failures (like providing text to a numeric field) to be ignored. Defaults to false.

default_operator

The default operator to be used, can be AND or OR. Defaults to OR.

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