---
title: Command line arguments
description: Config files to load are set using the -c flag on command line. If no flag is given, a beat and OS-specific default file path will be assumed. You can...
url: https://www.elastic.co/elastic/docs-builder/docs/3028/reference/beats/libbeat/config-file-format-cli
products:
  - Beats
applies_to:
  - Elastic Cloud Serverless: Generally available
  - Elastic Stack: Generally available
---

# Command line arguments
Config files to load are set using the `-c` flag on command line. If no flag is given, a beat and OS-specific default file path will be assumed.
You can specify multiple configuration files by repeating the `-c` flag. You can use this, for example, for setting defaults in a base configuration file, and overwrite settings via local configuration files.
In addition to overwriting settings using multiple configuration files, individual settings can be overwritten using `-E <setting>=<value>`. The `<value>` can be either a single value or a complex object, such as a list or dictionary.
For example, given the following configuration:
```yaml
output.elasticsearch:
  hosts: ["http://localhost:9200"]
  username: username
  password: password
```

You can disable the Elasticsearch output and write all events to the console by setting:
```sh
-E output='{elasticsearch.enabled: false, console.pretty: true}'
```

Any complex objects that you specify at the command line are merged with the original configuration, and the following configuration is passed to the Beat:
```yaml
output.elasticsearch:
  enabled: false
  hosts: ["http://localhost:9200"]
  username: username
  password: password

output.console:
  pretty: true
```