elasticsearch/docs/reference/elasticsearch-plugins/discovery-gce-usage.md

---

mapped_pages:

• https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/elasticsearch/plugins/current/discovery-gce-usage.html ---

GCE Virtual Machine discovery [discovery-gce-usage]

Google Compute Engine VM discovery allows to use the google APIs to perform automatic discovery of seed hosts. Here is a simple sample configuration:

cloud:
  gce:
    project_id: <your-google-project-id>
    zone: <your-zone>
discovery:
  seed_providers: gce

The following gce settings (prefixed with cloud.gce) are supported:

project_id : Your Google project id. By default the project id will be derived from the instance metadata.

```
Note: Deriving the project id from system properties or environment variables
(`GOOGLE_CLOUD_PROJECT` or `GCLOUD_PROJECT`) is not supported.
```

zone : helps to retrieve instances running in a given zone. It should be one of the GCE supported zones. By default the zone will be derived from the instance metadata. See also Using GCE zones.

retry : If set to true, client will use ExponentialBackOff policy to retry the failed http request. Defaults to true.

max_wait : The maximum elapsed time after the client instantiating retry. If the time elapsed goes past the max_wait, client stops to retry. A negative value means that it will wait indefinitely. Defaults to 0s (retry indefinitely).

refresh_interval : How long the list of hosts is cached to prevent further requests to the GCE API. 0s disables caching. A negative value will cause infinite caching. Defaults to 0s.

::::{admonition} Binding the network host :class: important

It’s important to define network.host as by default it’s bound to localhost.

You can use core network host settings or gce specific host settings:

::::