Configure access to LLMs

Elastic's AI features work with the out-of-the-box Elastic Managed LLMs or with third-party LLMs that you connect through inference endpoints or connectors.

Elastic Managed LLMs

Elastic Managed LLMs are available in Kibana deployments and serverless projects with an appropriate subscription or feature tier. They provide immediate access to generative AI features without requiring any setup or external model integration.

Elastic Managed LLMs are available out-of-the box. They do not require manual configuration or API key management. Alternatively, you can configure and use third-party LLM connectors, such as OpenAI, Azure, or Amazon Bedrock.

To learn more about security and data privacy, refer to Elastic Managed LLMs which provides details on the models.

Important

Using Elastic Managed LLMs incurs additional costs. Refer to Elastic Cloud pricing for more information.

Tested models and performance ratings

While you can connect to a wide range of LLMs, model performance varies by solution and use case. Refer to the following pages for performance information for models Elastic has tested:

Note

Models that do not appear in these resources may still work, but Elastic hasn't tested them for those scenarios. We recommend selecting a model with strong ratings for your intended use case.

Connect to a third-party or self-managed LLM

Important

The OpenAI, Amazon Bedrock, Google Gemini, and AI Connector connector types are being replaced by Elasticsearch inference endpoints and will be removed entirely in Elastic Stack 10.0 or in January 2028, whichever comes first. To configure access to an LLM provider, create an inference endpoint with the chat_completion task type. For steps that use your own provider account and API key, refer to External inference. To use models that Elastic hosts instead, refer to Elastic Managed LLMs.

Availability of these connector types depends on your deployment and version:

Elastic Cloud Serverless projects are autoscaled environments, fully managed by Elastic and available on Elastic Cloud. Availability Deprecated This functionality is deprecated. You can still use it, but it'll be removed in a future Elastic Cloud Serverless update. The Elastic Stack includes Elastic's core products such as Elasticsearch, Kibana, Logstash, and Beats. Availability Planned for deprecation This functionality is planned to be deprecated in a future Elastic Stack update. Subject to changes. This documentation corresponds to the latest patch available for each minor version. If you're not using the latest patch, check the release notes for changes. You can no longer create new connectors of these types by selecting Create connector in Kibana. Existing connectors and their rule actions continue to work, but the Connectors page hides them by default. To show them, open Display options and set Deprecated to Show.
The Elastic Stack includes Elastic's core products such as Elasticsearch, Kibana, Logstash, and Beats. Availability Deprecated in 9.5 This functionality is deprecated. You can still use it, but it'll be removed in a future Elastic Stack update. This documentation corresponds to the latest patch available for each minor version. If you're not using the latest patch, check the release notes for changes. These connector types are still available, but deprecated.

Follow these guides to connect to one or more third-party LLM providers:

Preconfigured connectors

You can also use preconfigured connectors to set up third-party LLM connectors by editing the kibana.yml file. This lets you enable a connector for multiple spaces at once, without performing setup in the Kibana UI for each space.

The Elastic Stack includes Elastic's core products such as Elasticsearch, Kibana, Logstash, and Beats. Availability Deprecated since 9.5 This functionality is deprecated. You can still use it, but it'll be removed in a future Elastic Stack update. This documentation corresponds to the latest patch available for each minor version. If you're not using the latest patch, check the release notes for changes. Preconfigured Generative AI connectors are deprecated too. For new setups, use inference endpoints.

If you use a preconfigured connector for your LLM connector, we recommend adding the exposeConfig: true parameter to the xpack.actions.preconfigured section of the kibana.yml config file. This parameter makes debugging easier by adding configuration information to the debug logs, including which LLM the connector uses.