Documentation

Manage Distinct Value Caches with InfluxDB 3 Explorer

Use InfluxDB 3 Explorer to manage Distinct Value Caches (DVCs) in an InfluxDB 3 instance or cluster. To navigate to the Distinct Value Cache management page:

  1. In the left navigation bar, select Configure > Caches.
  2. Select the Distinct Value Caches tab.

View Distinct Value Caches

To view DVCs associated with a database, navigate to the Distinct Value Cache management page and select the database from the Select Database dropdown menu. The page lists all DVCs associated with the selected database.

Create a Distinct Value Cache

On the Distinct Value Cache management page:

  1. Click + Create Cache.

  2. Provide the following:

    • Cache name: A unique name for the cache.

    • Database: The database the cache is associated with.

    • Table: The target table for the cache. As data is written to the table, it populates the cache. You must select a database before you can select a table.

    • Column names: Select columns to cache distinct values from. These are typically InfluxDB tags, but you can also use fields. combinations to cache. Once this limit is exceeded, InfluxDB drops the oldest cached distinct values.

    • Max Age: Specify the maximum age of cached values as a duration in humantime form. The default is 24h.

      Higher cardinality (more distinct values) in a DVC increases memory usage.

  3. Click Create.

Query a Distinct Value Cache

Use the Data Explorer to query a DVC:

  1. In the left navigation, select Query Data > Data Explorer.
  2. Select the database you want to query from the Select database dropdown menu.
  3. Click the icon next to the table associated with the DVC you want to query to expand the table. Tables with DVCs have a DVC badge below the icon.
  4. Under the Caches section of the expanded table, DVCs are identified by the DVC badge. Click the name of the DVC to generate a SQL query that queries everything from the DVC. You can also expand the DVC and select specific columns to query.
  5. Click Run Query to execute the query and return results from the cache.

Delete a Distinct Value Cache

On the Distinct Value Cache management page:

  1. Select the database associated with the cache you want to delete from the Select Database dropdown menu.
  2. In the Active Caches table, click the icon next to the cache you want to delete.

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New in InfluxDB 3.5

Key enhancements in InfluxDB 3.5 and the InfluxDB 3 Explorer 1.3.

See the Blog Post

InfluxDB 3.5 is now available for both Core and Enterprise, introducing custom plugin repository support, enhanced operational visibility with queryable CLI parameters and manual node management, stronger security controls, and general performance improvements.

InfluxDB 3 Explorer 1.3 brings powerful new capabilities including Dashboards (beta) for saving and organizing your favorite queries, and cache querying for instant access to Last Value and Distinct Value caches—making Explorer a more comprehensive workspace for time series monitoring and analysis.

For more information, check out:

InfluxDB Docker latest tag changing to InfluxDB 3 Core

On November 3, 2025, the latest tag for InfluxDB Docker images will point to InfluxDB 3 Core. To avoid unexpected upgrades, use specific version tags in your Docker deployments.

If using Docker to install and run InfluxDB, the latest tag will point to InfluxDB 3 Core. To avoid unexpected upgrades, use specific version tags in your Docker deployments. For example, if using Docker to run InfluxDB v2, replace the latest version tag with a specific version tag in your Docker pull command–for example:

docker pull influxdb:2