consul/website/content/commands/peering/establish.mdx

---
layout: commands
page_title: 'Commands: Peering Establish'
description: Learn how to use the consul peering establish command to establish a peering connection between Consul clusters.
---

# Consul Peering Establish

Command: `consul peering establish`

Corresponding HTTP API Endpoint: [\[POST\] /v1/peering/establish](/api-docs/peering#establish-a-peering-connection)

The `peering establish` starts a peering connection with the cluster that generated the peering token.
You can generate cluster peering tokens using the [`consul peering generate-token`](/commands/operator/generate-token) command or the [HTTP API](https://www.consul.io/api-docs/peering#generate-a-peering-token).

You can only use a peering token to establish the connection once. If you need to reestablish a peering connection, you must generate a new token.

The table below shows this command's [required ACLs](/api-docs#authentication).

| ACL Required |
| ------------ |
| `peering:write`  |

## Usage

Usage: `consul peering establish [options] -name <peer name> -peering-token <token>`

#### Command Options

- `-name=<string>` - (Required) Specifies a local name for the cluster you are establishing a connection with. The `name` is only used to identify the connection with the peer.

- `-peering-token=<string>` - (Required) Specifies the peering token from the cluster that generated the token.

- `-meta=<string>=<string>` - Specifies key/value pairs to associate with the peering connection in `-meta="key"="value"` format. You can use the flag multiple times to set multiple metadata fields.

#### Enterprise Options

@include 'http_api_partition_options.mdx'

#### API Options

@include 'http_api_options_client.mdx'

## Examples

The following examples establishes a peering connection with a cluster locally referred to as "cluster-01":

```shell-session hideClipboard
$ consul peering establish -name cluster-01 -peering-token eyJDQSI6bnVs...5Yi0wNzk5NTA1YTRmYjYifQ==
Successfully established peering connection with cluster-01
```