Query with the InfluxDB API

This page documents an earlier version of InfluxDB OSS. InfluxDB 3 Core is the latest stable version.

API token hashing is enabled by default in InfluxDB OSS 2.9.0

Stronger token security: tokens are stored as hashes on disk, so a copy of the database file doesn’t expose usable tokens. Existing tokens are hashed on first startup and the original strings can’t be recovered afterward — capture any plaintext tokens you still need before you upgrade.

For more information, see Token hashing.

The InfluxDB v2 API provides a programmatic interface for all interactions with InfluxDB. To query InfluxDB 2.9, do one of the following:

Send a Flux query request

Send a Flux query request to the following endpoint:

POST /api/v2/query

In your request, set the following:

  • Your organization via the org or orgID URL parameters
  • Headers:
    • Authorization: Token <API_TOKEN>
    • Accept: application/csv
    • Content-type: application/vnd.flux
  • Your Flux query text in the request body

Use gzip to compress a large query response

To compress the query response, set the Accept-Encoding header to gzip. This saves network bandwidth, but increases server-side load.

We recommend only using gzip compression on responses that are larger than 1.4 KB. If the response is smaller than 1.4 KB, gzip encoding will always return a 1.4 KB response, despite the uncompressed response size. 1500 bytes (~1.4 KB) is the maximum transmission unit (MTU) size for the public network and is the largest packet size allowed at the network layer.

Flux - Example query request

The following example shows how to use cURL to send a Flux query to InfluxDB 2.9:

Without compression With compression

curl \
  --request POST \
  http://localhost:8086/api/v2/query?orgID=
ORG_ID
  \
  --header 'Authorization: Token 
API_TOKEN
' \
  --header 'Accept: application/csv' \
  --header 'Content-type: application/vnd.flux' \
  --data 'from(bucket:"
BUCKET_NAME
")
        |> range(start: -12h)
        |> filter(fn: (r) => r._measurement == "example-measurement")
        |> aggregateWindow(every: 1h, fn: mean)'
curl \
  --request POST \
  http://localhost:8086/api/v2/query?orgID=
ORG_ID
 \
  --header 'Authorization: Token 
API_TOKEN
' \
  --header 'Accept: application/csv' \
  --header 'Content-type: application/vnd.flux' \
  --header 'Accept-Encoding: gzip' \
  --data 'from(bucket:"
BUCKET_NAME
")
        |> range(start: -12h)
        |> filter(fn: (r) => r._measurement == "example-measurement")
        |> aggregateWindow(every: 1h, fn: mean)'

Replace the following with your values:

  • ORG_ID - the ID of the organization that owns the bucket.
  • API_TOKEN - your token.
  • BUCKET_NAME - the name of the bucket to query.

Send an InfluxQL query request

To query InfluxDB 2.9 using the InfluxQL query language, send a request to the v1-compatible API endpoint:

GET /query
POST /query

In your request, set the following:

  • 1.x-compatible or 2.x authentication credentials
  • Headers:
    • Accept: application/csv or Accept: application/json
    • Content-type: application/vnd.influxql
  • The database and retention policy mapped to the bucket you want to query
  • Your InfluxQL query text

If you have an existing bucket that doesn’t follow the database/retention-policy naming convention, you must manually create a database and retention policy mapping to query that bucket with the /query compatibility API. Use the db and rp query parameters to specify the database and retention policy for the bucket you want to query.

InfluxQL - Example query request

The following example shows how to use cURL to send an InfluxQL query to InfluxDB 2.9 using v1-compatible authentication:

HTTP POST HTTP GET

# 1.x compatible POST request using Basic authentication and InfluxQL
curl --request POST \
  "http://localhost:8086/query?db=
BUCKET_NAME
&p=
API_TOKEN
&u=ignored" \
  --header "Content-type: application/vnd.influxql" \
  --data "SELECT * FROM home WHERE time > now() - 1h"
# 1.x compatible GET request using Basic authentication and InfluxQL
curl --get "http://localhost:8086/query" \
  --header "Accept: application/json" \
  --data-urlencode "q=SELECT * FROM home WHERE time > now() - 1h" \
  --data-urlencode "db=
BUCKET_NAME
" \
  --data-urlencode "u=ignored" \
  --data-urlencode "p=
API_TOKEN
"

Replace the following with your values:

  • API_TOKEN - your token.
  • BUCKET_NAME - the name of the bucket to query.

Without compression With compression

curl --get "http://localhost:8086/query" \
  --header 'Accept: application/csv' \
  --header 'Content-type: application/json' \
  --data-urlencode "db=
BUCKET_NAME
" \
  --data-urlencode "p=
API_TOKEN
" \
  --data-urlencode "u=ignored" \
  --data-urlencode "q=SELECT used_percent FROM example-db.example-rp.example-measurement WHERE host=host1"
curl --get "http://localhost:8086/query" \
  --header 'Accept: application/csv' \
  --header 'Content-type: application/json' \
  --header 'Accept-Encoding: gzip' \
  --data-urlencode "db=
BUCKET_NAME
" \
  --data-urlencode "p=
API_TOKEN
" \
  --data-urlencode "u=ignored" \
  --data-urlencode "q=SELECT used_percent FROM example-db.example-rp.example-measurement WHERE host=host1"

Replace the following with your values:

  • API_TOKEN - your token.
  • BUCKET_NAME - the name of the bucket to query.

InfluxDB returns the query results in annotated CSV.

query

Was this page helpful?

Thank you for your feedback!