FlatSearch Isn't Bringing Back All Elements in a Search

Support
1

Description

I receive the following error message when performing a search search:

{"action":"flatSearch","level":"warning","msg":"trying to get candidate: 4315 but we only have: 1000 elements.","time":"2025-05-25T00:52:03Z"}

For context, I’m switching from a multi-tenancy setup to non multi-tenancy so I can evenly distribute data across nodes as certain tenants are using all of my nodes memory. Does anyone have any suggestions to keep flatSearch going and let the searches resolve? Otherwise should I switch search types?

Any suggestions to resolve this would be greatly appreciated.

Server Setup Information

  • Weaviate Server Version:
  • Deployment Method: Docker on AWS ECS
  • Multi Node? Number of Running Nodes: 1.24.21
  • Client Language and Version: 4.6.5
  • Multitenancy?: No

Any additional Information

2

Hi @dhanshew72,

It looks like this issue might be related to the search limit :thinking:.

:pushpin: Indexing Recommendations in general:

  • FLAT index: Recommended for collections under 10,000 objects
  • HNSW index: Recommended for collections over 10,000 objects
  • Always index only the properties you plan to query

Try reducing the search limit to match or stay below the number of available objects. For larger datasets, consider switching to an HNSW or dynamic index to improve performance and scalability.

Lastly, I noticed you’re using a very outdated version of Weaviate. A lot has changed—including performance improvements, bug fixes, and even some breaking changes. I highly recommend upgrading to the latest version, v1.31.0, and re-evaluating after the upgrade.

Best regards,

Mohamed Shahin
Weaviate Support Engineer
(Ireland, GMT/UTC timezone)