rpk topic create

Create topics.

Topics created with this command will have the same number of partitions, replication factor, and key/value configs.

For more information about topics, see rpk topic describe.

Usage

rpk topic create [TOPICS...] [flags]

Flags

Value Type Description

-d, --dry

-

Dry run: validate the topic creation request; do not create topics.

-h, --help

-

Help for create.

--if-not-exists

-

Only create the topic if it does not already exist.

-p, --partitions

int32

Number of partitions to create per topic; -1 defaults to the cluster property default_topic_partitions (default -1).

-r, --replicas

int16

Replication factor (must be odd); -1 defaults to the cluster’s default_topic_replications (default -1). In Redpanda Cloud, the replication factor is set to 3.

-c, --topic-config

string (repeatable)

Topic properties can be set by using <key>=<value>. For example -c cleanup.policy=compact. This flag is repeatable, so you can set multiple parameters in a single command.

--config

string

Redpanda or rpk config file; default search paths are /var/lib/redpanda/.config/rpk/rpk.yaml, $PWD/redpanda.yaml, and /etc/redpanda/redpanda.yaml.

-X, --config-opt

stringArray

Override rpk configuration settings. See rpk -X or execute rpk -X help for inline detail or rpk -X list for terser detail.

--profile

string

Profile to use. See rpk profile for more details.

-v, --verbose

-

Enable verbose logging.
For the full list of properties, see Topic Properties

Starting in Redpanda v25.3, several topic properties support enhanced tristate behavior. Properties like retention.ms, retention.bytes, segment.ms, and others now distinguish between zero values (immediate eligibility for cleanup/compaction) and negative values (disable the feature entirely). Previously, zero and negative values were treated the same way. For the complete list of affected properties and detailed information, see Redpanda v25.3 behavior changes. Review your topic configurations if you currently use zero values for these properties.

Examples

Create a topic

Create a topic named my-topic:

rpk topic create my-topic

Output:

TOPIC     STATUS
my-topic  OK

Create multiple topics

Create two topics (my-topic-1, my-topic-2) at the same time with one command:

rpk topic create my-topic-1 my-topic-2

Output:

TOPIC       STATUS
my-topic-1  OK
my-topic-2  OK

Set a topic property

Create topic my-topic-3 with the topic property cleanup.policy=compact:

rpk topic create my-topic-3 -c cleanup.policy=compact

Output:

TOPIC       STATUS
my-topic-3  OK

Create topic with multiple partitions

Create topic my-topic-4 with 20 partitions:

rpk topic create my-topic-4 -p 20

Output:

TOPIC       STATUS
my-topic-4  OK

Create topic with multiple replicas

The replication factor must be a positive, odd number (such as 3), and it must be equal to or less than the number of available brokers.

Create topic my-topic-5 with 3 replicas:

rpk topic create my-topic-5 -r 3

Output:

TOPIC       STATUS
my-topic-5  OK

Combine flags

You can combine flags in any way you want. This example creates two topics, topic-1 and topic-2, each with 20 partitions, 3 replicas, and the cleanup policy set to compact:

rpk topic create -c cleanup.policy=compact -r 3 -p 20 topic-1 topic-2

Output:

TOPIC       STATUS
topic-1  OK
topic-2  OK