OpenSearch
Open-source search and analytics suite by AWS and the Linux Foundation. Fork of Elasticsearch providing full-text search, log analytics, and security analytics capabilities.
Use Cases
Free Tier
Completely free self-hosted (Apache 2.0 license). No usage limits. AWS managed service offers 750 hours/month of t3.small.search instances for 12 months.
How to Maximize the Free Tier
Download the distribution from opensearch.org and run locally or on your own server — zero cost, no licensing fees. For a managed option, new AWS accounts get 750 hours/month of t3.small.search, 10GB storage, and 20GB EBS free for 12 months. Use Docker for quick local testing: 'docker run -p 9200:9200 opensearchproject/opensearch'. Start with a single node and add nodes as your index grows. The OpenSearch Dashboards UI gives you visualization and query tools out of the box.
Getting Started
1) Download tarball or Docker image from opensearch.org. 2) Run './opensearch-tar-install.sh' or 'docker run -p 9200:9200 opensearchproject/opensearch'. 3) Access at http://localhost:9200. 4) Create an index and index documents via REST API. 5) For managed: create domain via AWS Console, configure access policies, connect via endpoint.
Pros
- Cost: 100% free to self-host with no licensing fees or usage-based pricing, ideal for high-volume search workloads
- Compatibility: Drop-in replacement for Elasticsearch 7.x APIs — existing Elasticsearch clients and code work with minimal changes
- Features: Includes full-text search, vector search, SQL support, anomaly detection, and built-in security (RBAC, TLS)
Cons
- Complexity: Requires significant setup and ongoing operational overhead — cluster management, backups, and scaling are manual
- Resource Usage: Java-based and memory-hungry; a minimal single node needs at least 2GB RAM, and production clusters require far more
- Documentation: Documentation is comprehensive but scattered across versions; some advanced features lack deep tutorials