Question

In elastic search, this filter

{
  "bool": {
    "must": {
      "term": {
        "article.title": "google"
      }
    }
  }
}

Properly returns articles with “google” in the title.

However,

{
  "bool": {
    "must": {
      "term": {
        "article.title": "google earth"
      }
    }
  }
}

Does not return any results, despite the fact that there are articles with the exact words “google earth” in the title. I would like it to do so.

The full query:

{
  "size": 200,
  "filter": {
    "bool": {
      "must": {
        "term": {
          "article.title": "google maps"
        }
      }
    }
  },
  {
    "range": {
      "created_date": {
        "from": "2013-01-11T02:14:03.352Z"
      }
    }
  }]
}
}

As you can see, I don’t have a “query” — just a filter, size, and range. So I take it that ElasticSearch is using the default analyzer…?

What am I misunderstanding?

---

EDIT: For those looking for the solution, here is my filter:

{
  "query": {
    "bool": {
      "must": {
        "must_match": {
          "article.title": "google earth"
        }
      }
    }
  }
}

Node that (1) we wrapped the bool filter with “query” and (2) the “term” changed to a “must_match”, which causes the entire phrase to be matched (as opposed to “match” which would search the article.title with a standard analyzer on google earth).

The full query looks like this:

{
  "size": 200,
  "filter": {
    "query": {
      "bool": {
        "must": {
          "must_match": {
            "article.title": "google earth"
          }
        }
      }
    }
  }
}

FWIW, the reason I have this condition within the “filter” field (as opposed to using a standard query) is that sometimes I want to use a “must_not” instead of a “must_not”, and sometimes I also add other elements to the query.

Answer 1

Elasticsearch isn’t using an analyzer at all, because you have used the term query, which looks for exact terms.

Your title field IS analyzed (unless you have specified otherwise), so "google earth" will have been indexed as the two terms ["google","earth"]. That’s why the term query for "google" works, but the term query for "google earth" doesn’t – that EXACT term does not exist.

If you use a match query instead, then your query terms will be analyzed before searching.