name : create-channel.rst **To create a channel** The following ``create-channel`` example creates a channel with the specified configuration. A channel collects data from an MQTT topic and archives the raw, unprocessed messages before publishing the data to a pipeline. :: aws iotanalytics create-channel \ --cli-input-json file://create-channel.json Contents of ``create-channel.json``:: { "channelName": "mychannel", "retentionPeriod": { "unlimited": true }, "tags": [ { "key": "Environment", "value": "Production" } ] } Output:: { "channelArn": "arn:aws:iotanalytics:us-west-2:123456789012:channel/mychannel", "channelName": "mychannel", "retentionPeriod": { "unlimited": true } } For more information, see `CreateChannel <https://docs.aws.amazon.com/iotanalytics/latest/APIReference/API_CreateChannel.html>`__ in the *AWS IoT Analytics API Reference*.