elastic/elasticsearch · error · IllegalStateException

Elasticsearch could not determine the origin of JVM option [

Error message

Elasticsearch could not determine the origin of JVM option [%s]. This indicates that it is running in an unsupported configuration.

What it means

Thrown by the JvmOption constructor when the origin argument is null. Every JVM option must be attributable to a source (jvm.options file, ES_JAVA_OPTS, vendor defaults, etc.); a null origin indicates the option came from an unknown/untracked source, signalling an unsupported ES configuration.

Source

Thrown at distribution/tools/server-cli/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/server/cli/JvmOption.java:38

import java.nio.file.Files;
import java.nio.file.Path;
import java.util.List;
import java.util.Locale;
import java.util.Map;
import java.util.Optional;
import java.util.function.Function;
import java.util.regex.Matcher;
import java.util.regex.Pattern;
import java.util.stream.Collectors;
import java.util.stream.Stream;

class JvmOption {
    private final String value;
    private final String origin;

    JvmOption(String value, String origin) {
        if (origin == null) {
            throw new IllegalStateException(Strings.format("""
                Elasticsearch could not determine the origin of JVM option [%s]. \
                This indicates that it is running in an unsupported configuration.""", value));
        }
        this.value = value;
        this.origin = origin;
    }

    public Optional<String> getValue() {
        return Optional.ofNullable(value);
    }

    public String getMandatoryValue() {
        return value;
    }

    public boolean isCommandLineOrigin() {
        return this.origin.contains("command line");
    }

View on GitHub (pinned to db6a809a66)

Solutions

1. Check the stack trace to see which call site built the JvmOption with null origin.
2. Restore the standard jvm.options file structure under config/jvm.options and vendor variants.
3. Avoid custom JVM injection mechanisms that bypass the documented ES_JAVA_OPTS / jvm.options path.

Example fix

// before
new JvmOption("-Xmx2g", null);

// after
new JvmOption("-Xmx2g", "config/jvm.options");

if (origin == null || origin.isBlank()) {
    throw new IllegalArgumentException("JvmOption origin must be non-null and non-blank for value: " + value);
}

When it happens

Trigger: Internal: code constructing JvmOption(value, null). This is an invariant violation in the JVM-option collection pipeline — the origin-tracking code path failed to record where the option came from.

Common situations: Running ES with a non-standard jvm.options layout the parser cannot attribute; a fork that injects JVM options without setting origin; a bug in vendor-options or ES_JAVA_OPTS handling that loses the origin string.

Related errors

• 78
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AI-assisted analysis of elastic/elasticsearch@db6a809a66 (2026-08-12). Data as JSON: /api/errors/6cbf220196882e4e. Report an issue: GitHub.