Span multi-term query

The span_multi query allows you to wrap a multi-term query (like wildcard, fuzzy, prefix, range, or regexp) as a span query. This enables you to use these more flexible matching queries within other span queries.

For example, you can use the span_multi query to:

• Find words with common prefixes near other terms.
• Match fuzzy variations of words within spans.
• Use regular expressions in span queries.

span_multi queries can potentially match many terms. To avoid excessive memory usage, you can:

• Set the rewrite parameter for the multi-term query.
• Use the top_terms_* rewrite method.
• Consider enabling the index_prefixes option for the text field if you use span_multi only for a prefix query. This automatically rewrites any prefix query on the field into a single-term query that matches the indexed prefix.

Example

To try the examples in this section, complete the setup steps.

The span_multi query uses the following syntax to wrap the prefix query:

"span_multi": { "match": { "prefix": { "description": { "value": "flutter" } } } } 

The following query searches for words starting with “dress” near any form of “sleeve” within at most 5 words of each other:

GET /clothing/_search { "query": { "span_near": { "clauses": [ { "span_multi": { "match": { "prefix": { "description": { "value": "dress" } } } } }, { "field_masking_span": { "query": { "span_term": { "description.stemmed": "sleev" } }, "field": "description" } } ], "slop": 5, "in_order": false } } } 

The query matches documents 1 (“Long-sleeved dress…”) and 4 (“…dresses with long fluttered sleeves…”) because “dress” and “long” occur within the maximum distance in both documents.

{ "took": 5, "timed_out": false, "_shards": { "total": 1, "successful": 1, "skipped": 0, "failed": 0 }, "hits": { "total": { "value": 2, "relation": "eq" }, "max_score": 1.7590723, "hits": [ { "_index": "clothing", "_id": "1", "_score": 1.7590723, "_source": { "description": "Long-sleeved dress shirt with a formal collar and button cuffs. " } }, { "_index": "clothing", "_id": "4", "_score": 0.84792376, "_source": { "description": "A set of two midi silk shirt dresses with long fluttered sleeves in black. " } } ] } } 

Parameters

The following table lists all top-level parameters supported by span_multi queries. All parameters are required.