---
title: Bootstrap Memory Lock Is False
description: Describes what AutoOps detects and surfaces with the Bootstrap Memory Lock Is False insight: Memory swapping is active while JVM heap is not locked in RAM.
url: https://docs-v3-preview.elastic.dev/elastic/autoops-insights/tree/main/elasticsearch/bootstrap_memory_lock_is_false
products:
  - Elastic Cloud Enterprise
  - Elastic Cloud Hosted
  - Elastic Cloud on Kubernetes
  - Elasticsearch
applies_to:
  - Elastic Cloud Hosted: Generally available
  - Elastic Cloud on Kubernetes: Generally available
  - Elastic Cloud Enterprise: Generally available
  - Self-managed Elastic deployments: Generally available
---

# Bootstrap Memory Lock Is False
Memory swapping is active while JVM heap is not locked in RAM. When Elasticsearch pages heap to disk, latency and GC behavior degrade sharply and can look like node failure.
<note>
  For a complete list of insights, refer to [AutoOps insights](https://docs-v3-preview.elastic.dev/elastic/autoops-insights/tree/main/elasticsearch).
</note>


## Insight details


| Field     | Value                          |
|-----------|--------------------------------|
| Component | Elasticsearch                  |
| Severity  | Medium                         |
| Scope     | Node                           |
| Domains   | performance, memory, stability |


## Example: What you might see in AutoOps

The following is an example of what you might see when this insight is triggered. Real insights use live data and links from your deployment or cluster.

### Memory swapping is enabled and the bootstrap.memory_lock setting is set to false


#### What was detected

_No description available._

#### Recommendations

<note>
  AutoOps shows different recommendations depending on how their conditions match your deployment or cluster.
</note>

<dropdown title="Enable memory lock on nodes">
  **Condition**: Always shown for this insight.As a last resort if OS-level memory locking is not enough, set `bootstrap.memory_lock: true` in `elasticsearch.yml` on each affected node, then perform a rolling restart. This keeps the JVM heap from being swapped out.
</dropdown>

<dropdown title="Enable OS memory lock">
  **Condition**: Always shown for this insight.Turn off memory swap so Elasticsearch can lock heap in RAM. On Linux, comment out swap entries in `/and so on/fstab`, or set `vm.swappiness` to `1`. On Windows, turn off the paging file under System Properties → Advanced → Performance → Advanced → Virtual memory.
</dropdown>


#### Background and impact

Impact: Nodes performance can be heavily penalized if the node is allowed to swap memory to disk.
The cluster can be configured to automatically prevent memory swapping on its host machine by setting the bootstrap.memory_lock to true.
If bootstrap checks are enabled, the cluster will start only if memory swapping is turned off.