Configure Packetbeat [configuring-howto-packetbeat]

::::{tip} To get started quickly, read Quick start: installation and configuration. ::::

To configure Packetbeat, edit the configuration file. The default configuration file is called packetbeat.yml. The location of the file varies by platform. To locate the file, see Directory layout.

There’s also a full example configuration file called packetbeat.reference.yml that shows all non-deprecated options.

::::{tip} See the Config File Format for more about the structure of the config file. ::::

The following topics describe how to configure Packetbeat:

• Network flows
• Protocols
• Processes
• General settings
• Project paths
• Traffic sniffing
• Output
• SSL
• Index lifecycle management (ILM)
• Elasticsearch index template
• {{kib}} endpoint
• Kibana dashboards
• Processors
• Internal queue
• Logging
• HTTP endpoint
• Instrumentation
• Feature flags
• packetbeat.reference.yml