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CloudWatch Logs Insights Query Syntax

CloudWatch Logs Insights supports a query language you can use to perform queries on your log groups. Each query can include one or more query commands separated by Unix-style pipe characters (|).

Six query commands are supported, along with many supporting functions and operations, including regular expressions, arithmetic operations, comparison operations, numeric functions, datetime functions, string functions, and generic functions.

Comments are also supported. Lines in a query that start with the # character are ignored.

CloudWatch Logs Insights Query Commands

The following table lists the six supported query commands along with basic examples. For more powerful sample queries, see Sample Queries.

Command	Description	Examples
fields	Retrieves the specified fields from log events. You can use functions and operations within a fields command.	fields `foo-bar`, action, abs(f3-f4) retrieves the fields foo-bar, action, and the absolute value of the difference between f3 and f4 for all log events in the log group. The backtick symbol ` is necessary around foo-bar because that field name includes a non-alphanumeric character. Any log field named in a query that has characters other than the @ sign, the period (.), and alphanumeric characters must be surrounded by backtick characters.
filter	Filters the results of a query based on one or more conditions. You can use comparison operators (=, !=, <, <=, >, >=), Boolean operators (and, or, and not) and regular expressions.	fields f1, f2, f3 | filter (duration>2000) retrieves the fields f1, f2, and f3 for all log events with a value over 2000 in the duration field. filter (duration>2000) is also a valid query, but the results do not show separate fields. Instead, the results show the @timestamp and all log data in the @message field for all log events where duration is more than 2000. fields f1, f2 | filter (f1=10 or f3>25) retrieves the fields f1 and f2 for all log events where f1 is 10 or f3 is greater than 25. fields f1 | filter statusCode like /2\d\d/ returns log events where the field statusCode has a value between 200 and 299.
stats	Calculates aggregate statistics based on the values of log fields. Several statistical operators are supported, including sum(), avg(), count(), ,min(), and max(). When you use stats, you can also use by to specify one or more criteria to use to group data when calculating the statistics.	stats avg (f1) by f2 calculates the average value of f1 for each unique value of f2.
sort	Sorts the retrieved log events. Both ascending (asc) and descending (desc) order are supported.	fields f1, f2, f3 | sort f1 desc retrieves the fields f1, f2, and f3 and sorts the returned events in descending order based on the value of f1.
limit	Limits the number of log events returned by the query.	fields f1, f2 | sort @timestamp desc | limit 25 retrieves the fields f1 and f2, sorts the events in descending order based on the value of @timestamp, and returns the first 25 events by sort order. In this case the sort order is by timestamp starting with the most recent, so the most recent 25 events are returned. Some sample queries provided with CloudWatch Logs Insights use head or tail commands instead of limit. These commands are being deprecated and have been replaced with limit. Use limit instead of head or tail in all queries you write.
parse	Extracts data from a log field, creating one or more ephemeral fields that you can process further in the query. parse accepts both glob expressions and regular expressions.	parse @message "user=*, method:*, latency := *" as @user, @method, @latency | stats avg(@latency) by @method, @user extracts the ephemeral fields @user, @method, and @latency from the log field @message and returns the average latency for each unique combination of @method and @user

Regular Expressions in the Filter Command

You can use like or =~ (equal sign followed by a tilde) in the filter query command to filter by substrings or regular expressions. Enclose your match string with double quotes or single quotes to perform substring matching. To perform regular expression matching, enclose it with forward slashes. The query returns only log events that match the criteria you set.

Examples

The following three examples return all events in which f1 contains the word Exception. The first two examples use regular expressions, and the third example uses a substring match. Each of these three examples is case-sensitive.

fields f1, f2, f3 | filter f1 like /Exception/

fields f1, f2, f3 | filter f1 =~ /Exception/

fields f1, f2, f3 | filter f1 like "Exception"

The following example uses a regular expression and returns all events in which f1 contains the word Exception. The query is not case-sensitive.

fields f1, f2, f3 | filter f1 like /(?i)Exception/ 

The following example uses a regular expression and returns all events in which f1 is exactly the word Exception. The query is not case-sensitive.

fields f1, f2, f3 | filter f1 =~ /^(?i)Exception$/

Using Aliases in Queries

You can use as to create one or more aliases in a query. Aliases are supported in the fields, stats, and sort commands.

You can create aliases for log fields and for the results of operations and functions.

Examples

The following examples show the use of aliases in query commands.

fields abs(myField) as AbsoluteValuemyField, myField2

Return the absolute value of myField as AbsoluteValuemyField and also returns the field myField2.

stats avg(f1) as myAvgF1 | sort myAvgF1 desc

Calculates the average of the values of the f1 as myAvgF1 and returns them in descending order by that value.

Using Comments in Queries

You can comment out lines in a query by using the # character. Lines that start with the # character are ignored. This can be useful to document your query or to temporarily ignore part of a complex query for one call, without deleting that line.

In the following example, the second line of the query is ignored.

fields @timestamp, @message
# | filter @message like /delay/
| limit 20

Supported Operations and Functions

The query language supports many types of operations and functions, as shown in the following tables.

Comparison Operations

You can use comparison operations in the filter command and as arguments for other functions. Comparison operations accept all data types as arguments and return a Boolean result.

= != < <= > >=

Arithmetic Operations

You can use arithmetic operations in the filter and fields commands and as arguments for other functions. Arithmetic operations accept numeric data types as arguments and return numeric results.

Operation	Description
a + b	Addition
a - b	Subtraction
a * b	Multiplication
a / b	Division
a ^ b	Exponentiation. 2 ^ 3 returns 8
a % b	Remainder or modulus. 10 % 3 returns 1

Numeric Operations

You can use numeric operations in the filter and fields commands and as arguments for other functions. Numeric operations accept numeric data types as arguments and return numeric results.

Operation	Description
abs(a)	Absolute value
ceil(a)	Round to ceiling (the smallest integer that is greater than the value of a).
floor(a)	Round to floor (the largest integer that is smaller than the value of a).
greatest(a,b,... z)	Returns the largest value.
least(a, b, ... z)	Returns the smallest value.
log(a)	Natural log
sqrt(a)	Square root

General Functions

You can use general functions in the filter and fields commands and as arguments for other functions.

Function	Arguments	Result type	Description
ispresent(fieldname)	Log field	Boolean	Returns true if the field exists.
coalesce(fieldname1, fieldname2, ... fieldnamex)	Log fields	Log field	Returns the first non-null value from the list.

String Functions

You can use string functions in the filter and fields commands and as arguments for other functions.

Function	Arguments	Result type	Description
isempty(fieldname)	String	Boolean	Returns true if the field is missing or is an empty string.
isblank(fieldname)	String	Boolean	Returns true if the field is missing, an empty string, or contains only white space.
concat(string1, string2, ... stringz)	Strings	String	Concatenates the strings.
ltrim(string) or ltrim(string1, string2)	String	String	Remove white space from the left of the string. If the function has a second string argument, it removes the characters of string2 from the left of string1. For example, ltrim("xyZfooxyZ","xyZ") returns "fooxyZ".
rtrim(string) or rtrim(string1, string2)	String	String	Remove white space from the right of the string. If the function has a second string argument, it removes the characters of string2 from the right of string1. For example, rtrim("xyZfooxyZ","xyZ") returns "xyZfoo".
trim(string) or trim(string1, string2)	String	String	Remove white space from both ends of the string. If the function has a second string argument, it removes the characters of string2 from both sides of string1. For example, trim("xyZfooxyZ","xyZ") returns "foo".
strlen(string)	String	Number	Returns the length of the string in Unicode code points.
toupper(string)	String	String	Converts the string to uppercase.
tolower(string)	String	String	Converts the string to lowercase.
substr(string1, x), or substr(string1, x, y)	String, Number or String, Number, Number	String	Returns a substring from the index specified by the number argument to the end of the string. If the function has a second number argument, it contains the length of the substring to be retrieved. For example, substr("xyZfooxyZ",3, 3) returns "foo".
replace(string1, string2, string3)	String, String, String	String	Replaces all instances of string2 in string1 with string3. For example: replace("foo","o","0") returns "f00".
strcontains(string1, string2)	String	Number	Returns 1 if string1 contains string2 and 0 otherwise.

Datetime Functions

You can use datetime functions in the filter and fields commands and as arguments for other functions. You can use these functions to create time buckets for queries with aggregate functions.

As part of datetime functions, you can use time periods that consist of a number and then either m for minutes or h for hours. For example, 10m is 10 minutes and 1h is one hour.

Function	Arguments	Result type	Description
datefloor(a, period)	Timestamp, period	Timestamp	Truncates the timestamp to the given period. For example, datefloor(@timestamp, 1h) truncates all values of @timestamp to the bottom of the hour.
dateceil(a, period)	Timestamp, period	Timestamp	Rounds up the timestamp to the given period and then truncates. For example, dateceil(@timestamp, 1h) truncates all values of @timestamp to the top of the hour.
bin(period)	period	Timestamp	Rounds the value of @timestamp to the given period and then truncates.

Aggregation Functions in the Stats Command

You can use aggregation functions in the stats command and as arguments for other functions.

Function	Arguments	Result type	Description
avg(NumericFieldname)	Numeric log field	Number	The average of the values in the specified field.
count(fieldname) or count(*)	Log field	Number	Counts the log records. count(*) counts all records in the log group, while count (fieldname) counts all records that include the specified field name.
count_distinct(fieldname)	Log field	Number	Returns the number of unique values for the field. If the field has very high cardinality (contains many unique values), the value returned by count_distinct is just an approximation.
max(fieldname)	Log field	Log field value	The maximum of the values for this log field in the queried logs.
min(fieldname)	Log field	Log field value	The minimum of the values for this log field in the queried logs.
pct(fieldname, value)	Log field value, value	Log field value	A percentile indicates the relative standing of a value in a dataset. For example, pct(@duration, 95) returns the @duration value at which 95 percent of the values of @duration are lower than this value, and 5 percent are higher than this value.
stddev(NumericFieldname)	Numeric log field	Number	The standard deviation of the values in the specified field.
sum(NumericFieldname)	Numeric log field	Number	The sum of the values in the specified field.