Shape field type

The shape data type facilitates the indexing of and searching with arbitrary x, y cartesian shapes such as rectangles and polygons. It can be used to index and query geometries whose coordinates fall in a 2-dimensional planar coordinate system.

You can query documents using this type using shape Query.

Like the geo_shape field type, the shape field mapping maps GeoJSON or Well-Known Text (WKT) geometry objects to the shape type. To enable it, users must explicitly map fields to the shape type.

Like geo_shape, the shape field type is indexed by decomposing geometries into a triangular mesh and indexing each triangle as a 7 dimension point in a BKD tree. The coordinates provided to the indexer are single precision floating point values so the field guarantees the same accuracy provided by the java virtual machine (typically 1E-38). For polygons/multi-polygons the performance of the tessellator primarily depends on the number of vertices that define the geometry.

IMPORTANT NOTES

CONTAINS relation query - shape queries with relation defined as contains are supported for indices created with ElasticSearch 7.5.0 or higher.

PUT /example
{
  "mappings": {
    "properties": {
      "geometry": {
        "type": "shape"
      }
    }
  }
}

This mapping definition maps the geometry field to the shape type. The indexer uses single precision floats for the vertex values so accuracy is guaranteed to the same precision as float values provided by the java virtual machine approximately (typically 1E-38).

Shapes can be represented using either the GeoJSON or Well-Known Text (WKT) format. The following table provides a mapping of GeoJSON and WKT to Elasticsearch types:

A point is a single coordinate in cartesian x, y space. It may represent the location of an item of interest in a virtual world or projected space. The following is an example of a point in GeoJSON.

POST /example/_doc
{
  "location" : {
    "type" : "point",
    "coordinates" : [-377.03653, 389.897676]
  }
}

The following is an example of a point in WKT:

POST /example/_doc
{
  "location" : "POINT (-377.03653 389.897676)"
}

A linestring defined by an array of two or more positions. By specifying only two points, the linestring will represent a straight line. Specifying more than two points creates an arbitrary path. The following is an example of a LineString in GeoJSON.

POST /example/_doc
{
  "location" : {
    "type" : "linestring",
    "coordinates" : [[-377.03653, 389.897676], [-377.009051, 389.889939]]
  }
}

The following is an example of a LineString in WKT:

POST /example/_doc
{
  "location" : "LINESTRING (-377.03653 389.897676, -377.009051 389.889939)"
}

A polygon is defined by a list of a list of points. The first and last points in each (outer) list must be the same (the polygon must be closed). The following is an example of a Polygon in GeoJSON.

POST /example/_doc
{
  "location" : {
    "type" : "polygon",
    "coordinates" : [
      [ [1000.0, -1001.0], [1001.0, -1001.0], [1001.0, -1000.0], [1000.0, -1000.0], [1000.0, -1001.0] ]
    ]
  }
}

The following is an example of a Polygon in WKT:

POST /example/_doc
{
  "location" : "POLYGON ((1000.0 -1001.0, 1001.0 -1001.0, 1001.0 -1000.0, 1000.0 -1000.0, 1000.0 -1001.0))"
}

The first array represents the outer boundary of the polygon, the other arrays represent the interior shapes ("holes"). The following is a GeoJSON example of a polygon with a hole:

POST /example/_doc
{
  "location" : {
    "type" : "polygon",
    "coordinates" : [
      [ [1000.0, -1001.0], [1001.0, -1001.0], [1001.0, -1000.0], [1000.0, -1000.0], [1000.0, -1001.0] ],
      [ [1000.2, -1001.2], [1000.8, -1001.2], [1000.8, -1001.8], [1000.2, -1001.8], [1000.2, -1001.2] ]
    ]
  }
}

The following is an example of a Polygon with a hole in WKT:

POST /example/_doc
{
  "location" : "POLYGON ((1000.0 1000.0, 1001.0 1000.0, 1001.0 1001.0, 1000.0 1001.0, 1000.0 1000.0), (1000.2 1000.2, 1000.8 1000.2, 1000.8 1000.8, 1000.2 1000.8, 1000.2 1000.2))"
}

IMPORTANT NOTE: WKT does not enforce a specific order for vertices. GeoJSON mandates that the outer polygon must be counterclockwise and interior shapes must be clockwise, which agrees with the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) Simple Feature Access specification for vertex ordering.

By default Elasticsearch expects vertices in counterclockwise (right hand rule) order. If data is provided in clockwise order (left hand rule) the user can change the orientation parameter either in the field mapping, or as a parameter provided with the document.

The following is an example of overriding the orientation parameters on a document:

POST /example/_doc
{
  "location" : {
    "type" : "polygon",
    "orientation" : "clockwise",
    "coordinates" : [
      [ [1000.0, 1000.0], [1000.0, 1001.0], [1001.0, 1001.0], [1001.0, 1000.0], [1000.0, 1000.0] ]
    ]
  }
}

The following is an example of a list of GeoJSON points:

POST /example/_doc
{
  "location" : {
    "type" : "multipoint",
    "coordinates" : [
      [1002.0, 1002.0], [1003.0, 2000.0]
    ]
  }
}

The following is an example of a list of WKT points:

POST /example/_doc
{
  "location" : "MULTIPOINT (1002.0 2000.0, 1003.0 2000.0)"
}

The following is an example of a list of GeoJSON linestrings:

POST /example/_doc
{
  "location" : {
    "type" : "multilinestring",
    "coordinates" : [
      [ [1002.0, 200.0], [1003.0, 200.0], [1003.0, 300.0], [1002.0, 300.0] ],
      [ [1000.0, 100.0], [1001.0, 100.0], [1001.0, 100.0], [1000.0, 100.0] ],
      [ [1000.2, 100.2], [1000.8, 100.2], [1000.8, 100.8], [1000.2, 100.8] ]
    ]
  }
}

The following is an example of a list of WKT linestrings:

POST /example/_doc
{
  "location" : "MULTILINESTRING ((1002.0 200.0, 1003.0 200.0, 1003.0 300.0, 1002.0 300.0), (1000.0 100.0, 1001.0 100.0, 1001.0 100.0, 1000.0 100.0), (1000.2 0.2, 1000.8 100.2, 1000.8 100.8, 1000.2 100.8))"
}

The following is an example of a list of GeoJSON polygons (second polygon contains a hole):

POST /example/_doc
{
  "location" : {
    "type" : "multipolygon",
    "coordinates" : [
      [ [[1002.0, 200.0], [1003.0, 200.0], [1003.0, 300.0], [1002.0, 300.0], [1002.0, 200.0]] ],
      [ [[1000.0, 200.0], [1001.0, 100.0], [1001.0, 100.0], [1000.0, 100.0], [1000.0, 100.0]],
        [[1000.2, 200.2], [1000.8, 100.2], [1000.8, 100.8], [1000.2, 100.8], [1000.2, 100.2]] ]
    ]
  }
}

The following is an example of a list of WKT polygons (second polygon contains a hole):

POST /example/_doc
{
  "location" : "MULTIPOLYGON (((1002.0 200.0, 1003.0 200.0, 1003.0 300.0, 1002.0 300.0, 102.0 200.0)), ((1000.0 100.0, 1001.0 100.0, 1001.0 100.0, 1000.0 100.0, 1000.0 100.0), (1000.2 100.2, 1000.8 100.2, 1000.8 100.8, 1000.2 100.8, 1000.2 100.2)))"
}

The following is an example of a collection of GeoJSON geometry objects:

POST /example/_doc
{
  "location" : {
    "type": "geometrycollection",
    "geometries": [
      {
        "type": "point",
        "coordinates": [1000.0, 100.0]
      },
      {
        "type": "linestring",
        "coordinates": [ [1001.0, 100.0], [1002.0, 100.0] ]
      }
    ]
  }
}

The following is an example of a collection of WKT geometry objects:

POST /example/_doc
{
  "location" : "GEOMETRYCOLLECTION (POINT (1000.0 100.0), LINESTRING (1001.0 100.0, 1002.0 100.0))"
}

Elasticsearch supports an envelope type, which consists of coordinates for upper left and lower right points of the shape to represent a bounding rectangle in the format [[minX, maxY], [maxX, minY]]:

POST /example/_doc
{
  "location" : {
    "type" : "envelope",
    "coordinates" : [ [1000.0, 100.0], [1001.0, 100.0] ]
  }
}

The following is an example of an envelope using the WKT BBOX format:

NOTE: WKT specification expects the following order: minLon, maxLon, maxLat, minLat.

POST /example/_doc
{
  "location" : "BBOX (1000.0, 1002.0, 2000.0, 1000.0)"
}

Due to the complex input structure and index representation of shapes, it is not currently possible to sort shapes or retrieve their fields directly. The shape value is only retrievable through the _source field.