Enable a receiver

A receiver is a Splunk software instance that is configured to listen on a specific port for incoming communications from a forwarder.

In a typical Splunk Enterprise deployment, the receiver is an indexer or a cluster of indexers. Sometimes the receiver is another forwarder; this is known as an intermediate forwarder. To learn more about how intermediate forwarders work, see Intermediate forwarding. As a best practice, configure your the receivers before configuring the forwarders to send data.

A Splunk Cloud Platform instance receiving port is configured and enabled by default. It is not possible to configure receiving on a Splunk Cloud Platform instance using Splunk Web, editing a .conf file, or using the command line (CLI.)

Configuring the receiver settings directly on Splunk software instances is only recommended for a single instance deployment. To manage Splunk Enterprise configurations in a distributed environment, see About deployment server and forwarder management in the Updating Splunk Enterprise Instances manual.

Configure a receiver using Splunk Web

Use Splunk Web to configure a receiver:

1. Log into Splunk Web as a user with the admin role.
2. In Splunk Web, go to Settings > Forwarding and receiving.
3. Select "Configure receiving."
4. Verify if there are existing receiver ports open. You cannot create a duplicate receiver port. The conventional receiver port configured on indexers is port 9997.
5. Select "New Receiving Port."
6. Add a port number and save.

Splunk Web is only available with Splunk Enterprise, not the universal forwarder.

Configure a receiver using the command line

Use the command line interface (CLI) to configure a receiver:

1. Open a shell prompt
2. Change the path to $SPLUNK_HOME/bin
3. Type: splunk enable listen <port> -auth <username>:<password> .
4. Restart Splunk software for the changes to take effect.

*nix example	Windows example
./splunk enable listen 9997 -auth admin:password	splunk enable listen 9997 -auth admin:password

Configure a receiver using a configuration file

Configure a receiver using the inputs.conf file:

1. Open a shell prompt
2. Change the path to $SPLUNK_HOME/etc/system/local.
3. Edit the inputs.conf file.
4. Create a [splunktcp] stanza and define the receiving port. Example:

   [splunktcp://9997]
   disabled = 0
   

5. Save the file.
6. Restart Splunk software for the changes to take effect.

The forms [splunktcp://9997] and [splunktcp://:9997] (one colon or two) are semantically equivalent. You can use either one.