Splunk® Enterprise

Search Reference

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Splunk Enterprise version 8.0 is no longer supported as of October 22, 2021. See the Splunk Software Support Policy for details. For information about upgrading to a supported version, see How to upgrade Splunk Enterprise.
This documentation does not apply to the most recent version of Splunk® Enterprise. For documentation on the most recent version, go to the latest release.
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Welcome to the Search Reference

This manual is a reference guide for the Search Processing Language (SPL). In this manual you will find a catalog of the search commands with complete syntax, descriptions, and examples. Additionally, this manual includes quick reference information about the categories of commands, the functions you can use with commands, and how SPL relates to SQL.

Getting Started

If you are new to Splunk software and searching, start with the Search Tutorial. This tutorial introduces you to the Search & Reporting application. The tutorial guides you through uploading data to your Splunk deployment, searching your data, and building simple charts, reports, and dashboards.

After you complete the Search Tutorial, and before you start using Splunk software on your own data you should:

Search Manual

The Search Manual is a companion manual to the Search Reference. The Search Manual contains detailed information about creating and optimizing searches.

  • Types of searches
  • Retrieving events
  • Specifying time ranges
  • Optimizing searches
  • Using subsearches
  • Creating statistical tables and charts
  • Grouping and correlating events
  • Predicting future events
  • Managing jobs

Quick Reference Information

The Quick Reference Guide contains:

  • Explanations about Splunk features
  • Common search commands
  • Tips on optimizing searches
  • Functions for the eval and stats commands
  • Search examples
  • Regular expressions
  • Formats for converting strings into timestamps

Command categories

The search commands by category topic organizes the commands by the type of action that the command performs.

For example, commands in the reporting category, are used to build transforming searches. Reporting commands return statistical data tables that are required for charts and other kinds of data visualizations.

This topic contains a brief description of each command along with a link to the details about the command in the Search Commands section of this manual.

Command syntax

Before you continue, see Understanding SPL syntax for the conventions and rules used in this manual.

Last modified on 03 September, 2020
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Understanding SPL syntax

This documentation applies to the following versions of Splunk® Enterprise: 7.0.0, 7.0.1, 7.0.2, 7.0.3, 7.0.4, 7.0.5, 7.0.6, 7.0.7, 7.0.8, 7.0.9, 7.0.10, 7.0.11, 7.0.13, 7.1.0, 7.1.1, 7.1.2, 7.1.3, 7.1.4, 7.1.5, 7.1.6, 7.1.7, 7.1.8, 7.1.9, 7.1.10, 7.2.0, 7.2.1, 7.2.2, 7.2.3, 7.2.4, 7.2.5, 7.2.6, 7.2.7, 7.2.8, 7.2.9, 7.2.10, 7.3.0, 7.3.1, 7.3.2, 7.3.3, 7.3.4, 7.3.5, 7.3.6, 7.3.7, 7.3.8, 7.3.9, 8.0.0, 8.0.1, 8.0.2


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