Expanding Your Cluster

This article explains how to permanently expand the capacity of your cluster. We also offer dynamic vertical scaling; refer to your cluster’s Resize page on Instaclustr Console for more information.  

The processing and storage capacity of an OpenSearch cluster scales linearly as new nodes are added. 

In general, you will want to keep the number of nodes balanced across OpenSearch rack configurations when adding nodes. So, if you have three racks in your cluster you will add nodes three at a time. 

Adding new nodes to a cluster can be completed without any interruption to service. However, the process of adding additional nodes causes relocation of shards between nodes, which temporarily puts additional load on the cluster. Therefore, we recommend scheduling for a low usage period. The process of a new node joining the cluster may take several hours. The overhead of syncing a new node is particularly apparent in a small cluster (as the new nodes are a more significant portion of the overall cluster capacity). 

1. To add nodes to your existing cluster, first login to the Instaclustr Console. 
2. Click the Add Nodes button in the menu for the cluster you wish to add the nodes to. 
3. On the Add Nodes page choose the number of new nodes and the type of node you want to add to your cluster. For node type, you can choose between Data And Ingest Node and Dedicated Ingest Node on a cluster without Dedicated Ingest Node, And you can choose between Dedicated Data Node and Dedicated Ingest Node on cluster with Dedicated Ingest Node. To begin the provisioning process, press the Add New Nodes button. For more information on Dedicated Ingest Node, refer to the official document. 

Note: To ensure consistent stability and performance, Instaclustr Support will verify the health of your cluster before provisioning additional nodes. We aim to complete this process within one business day and will contact you once the additional nodes have been provisioned.