Migrate system indices

When you migrate your Elasticsearch data into a new infrastructure, you might also want to migrate system-level indices and data streams, such as those used by Kibana or security features (for example, .kibana and .security).

Starting in Elasticsearch 8.0, you can use feature states to back up and restore all system indices and system data streams. This is the only available method for migrating this type of data.

However, using snapshot and restore for system indices does not mean you must use it for everything. You can still migrate other data by re-indexing from the source or a remote cluster.

To restore system indices from a snapshot, follow the same procedure described in Migrate Elasticsearch data using snapshots and select the appropriate feature states when preparing the restore operation, such as kibana or security.

For more details about restoring feature states, or the entire cluster state, refer to Restore a snapshot > Restore a feature state.

The following example describes how to restore the security feature using the restore snapshot API:

POST _snapshot/REPOSITORY/SNAPSHOT_NAME/_restore
{
  "indices": "-*",
  "ignore_unavailable": true,
  "include_global_state": false,
  "include_aliases": false,
  "feature_states": [
    "security"
  ]
}