---
title: Geotile grid aggregation
description: A multi-bucket aggregation that groups geo_point and geo_shape values into buckets that represent a grid. The resulting grid can be sparse and only contains...
url: https://www.elastic.co/elastic/docs-builder/docs/3016/reference/aggregations/search-aggregations-bucket-geotilegrid-aggregation
products:
- Elasticsearch
---
# Geotile grid aggregation
A multi-bucket aggregation that groups [`geo_point`](https://www.elastic.co/elastic/docs-builder/docs/3016/reference/elasticsearch/mapping-reference/geo-point) and [`geo_shape`](https://www.elastic.co/elastic/docs-builder/docs/3016/reference/elasticsearch/mapping-reference/geo-shape) values into buckets that represent a grid. The resulting grid can be sparse and only contains cells that have matching data. Each cell corresponds to a [map tile](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiled_web_map) as used by many online map sites. Each cell is labeled using a `"{{zoom}}/{x}/{{y}}"` format, where zoom is equal to the user-specified precision.
- High precision keys have a larger range for x and y, and represent tiles that cover only a small area.
- Low precision keys have a smaller range for x and y, and represent tiles that each cover a large area.
See [zoom level documentation](https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Zoom_levels) on how precision (zoom) correlates to size on the ground. Precision for this aggregation can be between 0 and 29, inclusive.
The highest-precision geotile of length 29 produces cells that cover less than a 10cm by 10cm of land and so high-precision requests can be very costly in terms of RAM and result sizes. Please see the example below on how to first filter the aggregation to a smaller geographic area before requesting high-levels of detail.
You can only use `geotile_grid` to aggregate an explicitly mapped `geo_point` or `geo_shape` field. If the `geo_point` field contains an array, `geotile_grid` aggregates all the array values.
## Simple low-precision request
```json
{
"mappings": {
"properties": {
"location": {
"type": "geo_point"
}
}
}
}
{"index":{"_id":1}}
{"location": "POINT (4.912350 52.374081)", "name": "NEMO Science Museum"}
{"index":{"_id":2}}
{"location": "POINT (4.901618 52.369219)", "name": "Museum Het Rembrandthuis"}
{"index":{"_id":3}}
{"location": "POINT (4.914722 52.371667)", "name": "Nederlands Scheepvaartmuseum"}
{"index":{"_id":4}}
{"location": "POINT (4.405200 51.222900)", "name": "Letterenhuis"}
{"index":{"_id":5}}
{"location": "POINT (2.336389 48.861111)", "name": "Musée du Louvre"}
{"index":{"_id":6}}
{"location": "POINT (2.327000 48.860000)", "name": "Musée d'Orsay"}
{
"aggregations": {
"large-grid": {
"geotile_grid": {
"field": "location",
"precision": 8
}
}
}
}
```
Response:
```json
{
...
"aggregations": {
"large-grid": {
"buckets": [
{
"key": "8/131/84",
"doc_count": 3
},
{
"key": "8/129/88",
"doc_count": 2
},
{
"key": "8/131/85",
"doc_count": 1
}
]
}
}
}
```
## High-precision requests
When requesting detailed buckets (typically for displaying a "zoomed in" map), a filter like [geo_bounding_box](https://www.elastic.co/elastic/docs-builder/docs/3016/reference/query-languages/query-dsl/query-dsl-geo-bounding-box-query) should be applied to narrow the subject area. Otherwise, potentially millions of buckets will be created and returned.
```json
{
"aggregations": {
"zoomed-in": {
"filter": {
"geo_bounding_box": {
"location": {
"top_left": "POINT (4.9 52.4)",
"bottom_right": "POINT (5.0 52.3)"
}
}
},
"aggregations": {
"zoom1": {
"geotile_grid": {
"field": "location",
"precision": 22
}
}
}
}
}
}
```
Response:
```json
{
...
"aggregations": {
"zoomed-in": {
"doc_count": 3,
"zoom1": {
"buckets": [
{
"key": "22/2154412/1378379",
"doc_count": 1
},
{
"key": "22/2154385/1378332",
"doc_count": 1
},
{
"key": "22/2154259/1378425",
"doc_count": 1
}
]
}
}
}
}
```
## Requests with additional bounding box filtering
The `geotile_grid` aggregation supports an optional `bounds` parameter that restricts the cells considered to those that intersect the provided bounds. The `bounds` parameter accepts the same [bounding box formats](/elastic/docs-builder/docs/3016/reference/query-languages/query-dsl/query-dsl-geo-bounding-box-query#query-dsl-geo-bounding-box-query-accepted-formats) as the geo-bounding box query. This bounding box can be used with or without an additional `geo_bounding_box` query for filtering the points prior to aggregating. It is an independent bounding box that can intersect with, be equal to, or be disjoint to any additional `geo_bounding_box` queries defined in the context of the aggregation.
```json
{
"aggregations": {
"tiles-in-bounds": {
"geotile_grid": {
"field": "location",
"precision": 22,
"bounds": {
"top_left": "POINT (4.9 52.4)",
"bottom_right": "POINT (5.0 52.3)"
}
}
}
}
}
```
Response:
```json
{
...
"aggregations": {
"tiles-in-bounds": {
"buckets": [
{
"key": "22/2154412/1378379",
"doc_count": 1
},
{
"key": "22/2154385/1378332",
"doc_count": 1
},
{
"key": "22/2154259/1378425",
"doc_count": 1
}
]
}
}
}
```
### Aggregating `geo_shape` fields
Aggregating on [Geoshape](https://www.elastic.co/elastic/docs-builder/docs/3016/reference/elasticsearch/mapping-reference/geo-shape) fields works almost as it does for points, except that a single shape can be counted for in multiple tiles. A shape will contribute to the count of matching values if any part of its shape intersects with that tile. Below is an image that demonstrates this:
## Options
(Required, string) Field containing indexed geo-point or geo-shape values. Must be explicitly mapped as a [`geo_point`](https://www.elastic.co/elastic/docs-builder/docs/3016/reference/elasticsearch/mapping-reference/geo-point) or a [`geo_shape`](https://www.elastic.co/elastic/docs-builder/docs/3016/reference/elasticsearch/mapping-reference/geo-shape) field. If the field contains an array, `geotile_grid` aggregates all array values.
(Optional, integer) Integer zoom of the key used to define cells/buckets in the results. Defaults to `7`. Values outside of [`0`,`29`] will be rejected.
(Optional, object) Bounding box used to filter the geo-points or geo-shapes in each bucket. Accepts the same bounding box formats as the [geo-bounding box query](/elastic/docs-builder/docs/3016/reference/query-languages/query-dsl/query-dsl-geo-bounding-box-query#query-dsl-geo-bounding-box-query-accepted-formats).
(Optional, integer) Maximum number of buckets to return. Defaults to 10,000. When results are trimmed, buckets are prioritized based on the volume of documents they contain.
(Optional, integer) Number of buckets returned from each shard. Defaults to `max(10,(size x number-of-shards))` to allow for a more accurate count of the top cells in the final result. Since each shard could have a different top result order, using a larger number here reduces the risk of inaccurate counts, but incurs a performance cost.