---
title: Curator and index lifecycle management
description: Beginning with Elasticsearch version 6.6, Elasticsearch has provided Index Lifecycle Management (ILM) to users with at least a Basic license. ILM provides...
url: https://www.elastic.co/elastic/docs-builder/docs/3028/reference/elasticsearch/curator/curator-ilm
products:
  - Elasticsearch
  - Elasticsearch Curator
---

# Curator and index lifecycle management
Beginning with Elasticsearch version 6.6, Elasticsearch has provided [Index Lifecycle Management](https://docs-v3-preview.elastic.dev/elastic/docs-builder/docs/3028/manage-data/lifecycle/index-lifecycle-management) (ILM) to users with at least a Basic license. ILM provides users with many of the most common index management features as a matter of policy, rather than execution time analysis (which is how Curator works).