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mongodump
mongodump
¶
On this page
macOS Sierra and Go 1.6 Incompatibility
Users running on macOS Sierra require the 3.2.10 or newer version
of mongodump
.
Upcoming Tools Migration in MongoDB 4.4
Starting in MongoDB 4.4, the mongodump
documentation
migrates to MongoDB Database Tools - mongodump. Refer to
that page for more information on the upcoming version of
mongodump
(tool version 100.0.0).
The documentation on this page only applies to the MongoDB 4.2
version of mongodump
. The MongoDB 4.2 version of
mongodump
is available for download following the instructions
in the Availability section below.
Synopsis¶
mongodump
is a utility for creating a binary export of
the contents of a database. mongodump
can export data
from either mongod
or mongos
instances;
i.e. can export data from standalone, replica set, and sharded cluster
deployments.
Note
If you are archiving stale data to save on storage costs, consider Online Archive in MongoDB Atlas. Online Archive automatically archives infrequently accessed data to fully-managed S3 buckets for cost-effective data tiering.
Availability¶
The mongodump
tool is part of the MongoDB tools package. Consult the
installation guide for your platform for
instructions on how to install the tools package as part of your
MongoDB installation.
The tools package is also available from the
MongoDB Download Center,
either as a separate tools
download, or contained within the
TGZ
or ZIP
downloads, depending on platform. On Windows, the MSI
installer includes all tools as part of the default installation.
Tip
If downloading the TGZ
or ZIP
files from the Download
Center, you may want to update your PATH
environment
variable to include the directory where you installed these tools.
See the installation guide
for your platform for more information.
Usage in Backup Strategy¶
Standalones/Replica Sets¶
For standalone or a replica set, mongodump
can be a part
of a backup strategy with
mongorestore
for partial backups based on a query,
syncing from production to staging or development environments, or
changing the storage engine of a standalone.
For an overview of mongodump
in conjunction with
mongorestore
part of a backup and recovery strategy, see:
Sharded Clusters¶
mongodump
and mongorestore
cannot be part of a backup strategy for 4.2+ sharded clusters
that have sharded transactions in progress, as backups created with
mongodump
do not maintain the atomicity guarantees
of transactions across shards.
For 4.2+ sharded clusters with in-progress sharded transactions, use one of the following coordinated backup and restore processes which do maintain the atomicity guarantees of transactions across shards:
Syntax¶
Run mongodump
from the system command line, not the mongo
shell.
Connect to a MongoDB Instance¶
To connect to a local MongoDB instance running on port 27017 and use
the default settings to export the content, run
mongodump
without any command-line options:
To specify a host and/or port of the MongoDB instance, you can either:
Specify the hostname and port in the
--uri connection string
:Specify the hostname and port in the
--host
:
For more information on the options available, see Options.
Connect to a Replica Set¶
To connect to a replica set to export its data, you can either:
Specify the replica set name and members in the
--uri connection string
:Specify the replica set name and members in the
--host
:
By default, mongodump
reads from the primary of the
replica set. To override the default, you can specify the read
preference:
You can specify the read preference in the
--uri connection string
If specifying the read preference tags, include the
readPreferenceTags
option:You can specify the read preference in using the
--readPreference
command-line option. The command-line option takes a string if specifying only the read preference mode:Or, the command-line option can takes a quote-enclosed document
'{ mode: <mode>, tagSets: [ <tag1>, ... ], maxStalenessSeconds:<num>}'
to specify the mode, the optional read preference tag sets, and the optional maxStalenessSeconds:
For more information on the options available, see Options.
Connect to a Sharded Cluster¶
To connect to a sharded cluster to export its data, you can either:
Specify the hostname of the
mongos
instance in the--uri connection string
Specify the hostname and port of the
mongos
instance in the--host
By default, mongodump
reads from the primary of the
shard replica set. To override the default, you can specify the read
preference:
You can specify the read preference in the
--uri connection string
If specifying the read preference tags, include the
readPreferenceTags
option:You can specify the read preference in using the
--readPreference
command-line option. The command-line option takes a string if specifying only the read preference mode:Or, the command-line option can takes a quote-enclosed document
'{ mode: <mode>, tagSets: [ <tag1>, ... ], maxStalenessSeconds: <num>}'
to specify the mode, the optional read preference tag sets, and the optional maxStalenessSeconds:
For more information on the options available, see Options.
See also
Behavior¶
Read Preference¶
By default, mongodump
uses read preference
primary
. To override the default, you can specify the
read preference in the
--readPreference
command-line
option or in the --uri connection string
.
Starting in version 4.2, if you specify read preference in the URI
string and the --readPreference
option, the --readPreference
value overrides the read preference specified in the URI string.
In earlier versions, the two options are incompatible.
Data Exclusion¶
mongodump
excludes the content of the local
database in its output.
mongodump
output only captures the documents in the
database and does not include index data. mongorestore
or mongod
must then rebuild the indexes after restoring
data.
Changed in version 3.4: MongoDB 3.4 added support for
read-only views. By default,
mongodump
only captures a view’s metadata: it does not
create a binary export of the documents included in the view. To
capture the documents in a view use --viewsAsCollections
.
Metadata Format¶
Starting in version 4.2, mongodump
uses Extended
JSON v2.0 (Canonical) format
for the metadata files. To parse these files for restore, use
mongorestore
version 4.2+ that supports Extended
JSON v2.0 (Canonical or Relaxed mode) format.
Tip
If general, use corresponding versions of mongodump
and mongorestore
. That is, to restore data files
created with a specific version of mongodump
, use the
corresponding version of mongorestore
.
Overwrite Files¶
mongodump
overwrites output files if they exist in the
backup data folder. Before running the mongodump
command
multiple times, either ensure that you no longer need the files in the
output folder (the default is the dump/
folder) or rename the
folders or files.
Data Compression Handling¶
When run against a mongod
instance that uses the
WiredTiger storage engine,
mongodump
outputs uncompressed data.
Required Access¶
To run mongodump
against a MongoDB deployment that has
access control enabled, you must have
privileges that grant find
action for each database to
back up. The built-in backup
role provides the required
privileges to perform backup of any and all databases.
The backup
role provides additional privileges to back
up the system.profile
collection that exists when running with database profiling.
Options¶
-
mongodump
¶
-
--help
¶
Returns information on the options and use of mongodump.
-
--verbose
,
-v
¶
Increases the amount of internal reporting returned on standard output or in log files. Increase the verbosity with the
-v
form by including the option multiple times, (e.g.-vvvvv
.)
-
--quiet
¶
Runs mongodump in a quiet mode that attempts to limit the amount of output.
This option suppresses:
- output from database commands
- replication activity
- connection accepted events
- connection closed events
-
--version
¶
Returns the mongodump release number.
-
--uri
=<connectionString>
¶ New in version 3.4.6.
Specify a resolvable URI connection string (enclose in quotes) to connect to the MongoDB deployment.
For information on the components of the connection string, see the Connection String URI Format documentation.
Note
For TLS/SSL options, use the command-line options instead of the URI options for TLS/SSL (Available starting in 4.2).
Important
The following command-line options cannot be used in conjunction with
--uri
option:--host
--port
--db
--username
--password
(if the URI connection string also includes the password)--authenticationDatabase
--authenticationMechanism
Instead, specify these options as part of your
--uri
connection string.
-
--host
=<hostname><:port>
,
-h
=<hostname><:port>
¶ Default: localhost:27017
Specifies a resolvable hostname for the
mongod
to which to connect. By default, the mongodump attempts to connect to a MongoDB instance running on the localhost on port number27017
.To connect to a replica set, specify the
replSetName
and a seed list of set members, as in the following:When specifying the replica set list format, mongodump always connects to the primary.
You can also connect to any single member of the replica set by specifying the host and port of only that member:
If you use IPv6 and use the
<address>:<port>
format, you must enclose the portion of an address and port combination in brackets (e.g.[<address>]
).Note
You cannot specify both
--host
and--uri
.Connections to MongoDB Atlas that use the
+srv
connection string option require the--uri
option.
-
--port
=<port>
¶ Default: 27017
Specifies the TCP port on which the MongoDB instance listens for client connections.
Note
You cannot specify both
--port
and--uri
.Connections to MongoDB Atlas that use the
+srv
connection string option require the--uri
option.
-
--ipv6
¶
Removed in version 3.0.
Enables IPv6 support and allows mongodump to connect to the MongoDB instance using an IPv6 network. Prior to MongoDB 3.0, you had to specify
--ipv6
to use IPv6. In MongoDB 3.0 and later, IPv6 is always enabled.
-
--ssl
¶
Enables connection to a
mongod
ormongos
that has TLS/SSL support enabled.For more information about TLS/SSL and MongoDB, see Configure mongod and mongos for TLS/SSL and TLS/SSL Configuration for Clients .
-
--sslCAFile
=<filename>
¶ Specifies the
.pem
file that contains the root certificate chain from the Certificate Authority. Specify the file name of the.pem
file using relative or absolute paths.If
--tlsCAFile
/net.tls.CAFile
(or their aliases--sslCAFile
/net.ssl.CAFile
) is not specified and you are not using x.509 authentication, the system-wide CA certificate store will be used when connecting to an TLS/SSL-enabled server.To use x.509 authentication,
--tlsCAFile
ornet.tls.CAFile
must be specified unless using--tlsCertificateSelector
or--net.tls.certificateSelector
. Or if using thessl
aliases,--sslCAFile
ornet.ssl.CAFile
must be specified unless using--sslCertificateSelector
ornet.ssl.certificateSelector
.Warning
Version 3.2 and earlier: For TLS/SSL connections (
--ssl
) tomongod
andmongos
, if the mongodump runs without the--sslCAFile
, mongodump will not attempt to validate the server certificates. This creates a vulnerability to expiredmongod
andmongos
certificates as well as to foreign processes posing as validmongod
ormongos
instances. Ensure that you always specify the CA file to validate the server certificates in cases where intrusion is a possibility.For more information about TLS/SSL and MongoDB, see Configure mongod and mongos for TLS/SSL and TLS/SSL Configuration for Clients .
-
--sslPEMKeyFile
=<filename>
¶ Specifies the
.pem
file that contains both the TLS/SSL certificate and key. Specify the file name of the.pem
file using relative or absolute paths.This option is required when using the
--ssl
option to connect to amongod
ormongos
that hasCAFile
enabled withoutallowConnectionsWithoutCertificates
.For more information about TLS/SSL and MongoDB, see Configure mongod and mongos for TLS/SSL and TLS/SSL Configuration for Clients .
-
--sslPEMKeyPassword
=<value>
¶ Specifies the password to de-crypt the certificate-key file (i.e.
--sslPEMKeyFile
). Use the--sslPEMKeyPassword
option only if the certificate-key file is encrypted. In all cases, the mongodump will redact the password from all logging and reporting output.If the private key in the PEM file is encrypted and you do not specify the
--sslPEMKeyPassword
option, the mongodump will prompt for a passphrase. See TLS/SSL Certificate Passphrase.For more information about TLS/SSL and MongoDB, see Configure mongod and mongos for TLS/SSL and TLS/SSL Configuration for Clients .
-
--sslCRLFile
=<filename>
¶ Specifies the
.pem
file that contains the Certificate Revocation List. Specify the file name of the.pem
file using relative or absolute paths.For more information about TLS/SSL and MongoDB, see Configure mongod and mongos for TLS/SSL and TLS/SSL Configuration for Clients .
-
--sslAllowInvalidCertificates
¶
Bypasses the validation checks for server certificates and allows the use of invalid certificates. When using the
allowInvalidCertificates
setting, MongoDB logs as a warning the use of the invalid certificate.Starting in MongoDB 4.0, if you specify
--sslAllowInvalidCertificates
ornet.ssl.allowInvalidCertificates: true
(or in MongoDB 4.2, the alias--tlsAllowInvalidateCertificates
ornet.tls.allowInvalidCertificates: true
) when using x.509 authentication, an invalid certificate is only sufficient to establish a TLS/SSL connection but is insufficient for authentication.Warning
Although available, avoid using the
--sslAllowInvalidCertificates
option if possible. If the use of--sslAllowInvalidCertificates
is necessary, only use the option on systems where intrusion is not possible.If the
mongo
shell (and other MongoDB Tools) runs with the--sslAllowInvalidCertificates
option, themongo
shell (and other MongoDB Tools) will not attempt to validate the server certificates. This creates a vulnerability to expiredmongod
andmongos
certificates as well as to foreign processes posing as validmongod
ormongos
instances. If you only need to disable the validation of the hostname in the TLS/SSL certificates, see--sslAllowInvalidHostnames
.For more information about TLS/SSL and MongoDB, see Configure mongod and mongos for TLS/SSL and TLS/SSL Configuration for Clients .
-
--sslAllowInvalidHostnames
¶
Disables the validation of the hostnames in TLS/SSL certificates. Allows mongodump to connect to MongoDB instances even if the hostname in their certificates do not match the specified hostname.
For more information about TLS/SSL and MongoDB, see Configure mongod and mongos for TLS/SSL and TLS/SSL Configuration for Clients .
-
--username
=<username>
,
-u
=<username>
¶ Specifies a username with which to authenticate to a MongoDB database that uses authentication. Use in conjunction with the
--password
and--authenticationDatabase
options.Note
You cannot specify both
--username
and--uri
.Connections to MongoDB Atlas that use the
+srv
connection string option require the--uri
option.
-
--password
=<password>
,
-p
=<password>
¶ Specifies a password with which to authenticate to a MongoDB database that uses authentication. Use in conjunction with the
--username
and--authenticationDatabase
options.To prompt the user for the password, pass the
--username
option without--password
or specify an empty string as the--password
value, as in--password ""
.Note
You cannot specify both
--password
and--uri
.Connections to MongoDB Atlas that use the
+srv
connection string option require the--uri
option.
-
--authenticationDatabase
=<dbname>
¶ Specifies the authentication database where the specified
--username
has been created. See Authentication Database.Note
You cannot specify both
--authenticationDatabase
and--uri
.Connections to MongoDB Atlas that use the
+srv
connection string option require the--uri
option.If you do not specify an authentication database, mongodump assumes that the database specified to export holds the user’s credentials.
If you do not specify an authentication database or a database to export, mongodump assumes the
admin
database holds the user’s credentials.
-
--authenticationMechanism
=<name>
¶ Default: SCRAM-SHA-1
Specifies the authentication mechanism the mongodump instance uses to authenticate to the
mongod
ormongos
.Changed in version 4.0: MongoDB removes support for the deprecated MongoDB Challenge-Response (
MONGODB-CR
) authentication mechanism.MongoDB adds support for SCRAM mechanism using the SHA-256 hash function (
SCRAM-SHA-256
).Value Description SCRAM-SHA-1 RFC 5802 standard Salted Challenge Response Authentication Mechanism using the SHA-1 hash function. SCRAM-SHA-256 RFC 7677 standard Salted Challenge Response Authentication Mechanism using the SHA-256 hash function. MONGODB-X509 MongoDB TLS/SSL certificate authentication. GSSAPI (Kerberos) External authentication using Kerberos. This mechanism is available only in MongoDB Enterprise. PLAIN (LDAP SASL) External authentication using LDAP. You can also use PLAIN
for authenticating in-database users.PLAIN
transmits passwords in plain text. This mechanism is available only in MongoDB Enterprise.Note
You cannot specify both
--authenticationMechanism
and--uri
.Connections to MongoDB Atlas that use the
+srv
connection string option require the--uri
option.
-
--gssapiServiceName
¶
Specify the name of the service using GSSAPI/Kerberos. Only required if the service does not use the default name of
mongodb
.This option is available only in MongoDB Enterprise.
-
--gssapiHostName
¶
Specify the hostname of a service using GSSAPI/Kerberos. Only required if the hostname of a machine does not match the hostname resolved by DNS.
This option is available only in MongoDB Enterprise.
-
--db
=<database>
,
-d
=<database>
¶ Specifies a database to backup. If you do not specify a database,
mongodump
copies all databases in this instance into the dump files.Note
You cannot specify both
--db
and--uri
.Connections to MongoDB Atlas that use the
+srv
connection string option require the--uri
option.
-
--collection
=<collection>
,
-c
=<collection>
¶ Specifies a collection to backup. If you do not specify a collection, this option copies all collections in the specified database or instance to the dump files.
-
--query
=<json>
,
-q
=<json>
¶ Provides a JSON document as a query that optionally limits the documents included in the output of
mongodump
. To use the--query
option, you must also specify the--collection
option.You must enclose the query document in single quotes (
'{ ... }'
) to ensure that it does not interact with your shell environment.Starting in MongoDB 4.2, the query must be in Extended JSON v2 format (either relaxed or canonical/strict mode), including enclosing the field names and operators in quotes. For example:
-
--queryFile
=<path>
¶ New in version 3.2.
Specifies the path to a file containing a JSON document as a query filter that limits the documents included in the output of
mongodump
.--queryFile
enables you to create query filters that are too large to fit in your terminal’s buffer.
-
--readPreference
=<string|document>
¶ Default:
primary
Specifies the read preference for mongodump. The
--readPreference
option can take:A string if specifying only the read preference mode:
A quote-enclosed document to specify the mode, the optional read preference tag sets, and the optional maxStalenessSeconds:
If specifying the maxStalenessSeconds, the value must be greater than or equal to 90.
New in version 4.2.
mongodump defaults to
primary
read preference.Starting in version 4.2, if the read preference is also included in the
--uri connection string
, the command-line--readPreference
overrides the read preference specified in the URI string.Warning
Using a read preference other than
primary
with a connection to amongos
may produce inconsistencies, duplicates, or result in missed documents.
-
--forceTableScan
¶
By default, mongodump uses the
_id
index when scanning collections with that index is available (for example, views do not have any indexes). Specify--forceTableScan
to direct mongodump to scan collection data without the use of the_id
index.--forceTableScan
does not ensure a point-in-time snapshot. Use--oplog
to create a point-in-time snapshot.You cannot use
--forceTableScan
with the--query
option.
-
--gzip
¶
New in version 3.2.
Compresses the output. If
mongodump
outputs to the dump directory, the new feature compresses the individual files. The files have the suffix.gz
.If
mongodump
outputs to an archive file or the standard out stream, the new feature compresses the archive file or the data output to the stream.
-
--out
=<path>
,
-o
=<path>
¶ Specifies the directory where
mongodump
will write BSON files for the dumped databases. By default,mongodump
saves output files in a directory nameddump
in the current working directory.To send the database dump to standard output, specify “
-
” instead of a path. Write to standard output if you want process the output before saving it, such as to usegzip
to compress the dump. When writing standard output,mongodump
does not write the metadata that writes in a<dbname>.metadata.json
file when writing to files directly.You cannot use the
--archive
option with the--out
option.
-
--archive
=<file>
¶ New in version 3.2.
Writes the output to a specified archive file or, if the archive file is unspecified, writes to the standard output (
stdout
).
-
--oplog
¶
Creates a file named
oplog.bson
as part of themongodump
output. Theoplog.bson
file, located in the top level of the output directory, contains oplog entries that occur during themongodump
operation. This file provides an effective point-in-time snapshot of the state of amongod
instance. To restore to a specific point-in-time backup, use the output created with this option in conjunction withmongorestore --oplogReplay
.Without
--oplog
, if there are write operations during the dump operation, the dump will not reflect a single moment in time. Changes made to the database during the update process can affect the output of the backup.Important
A
mongodump
running with--oplog
fails if a client issues any of the listed operations during the dump process.--oplog
has no effect when runningmongodump
against amongos
instance to dump the entire contents of a sharded cluster. However, you can use--oplog
to dump individual shards.--oplog
only works against nodes that maintain an oplog. This includes all members of a replica set.--oplog
does not dump the oplog collection.Note
To use
mongodump
with--oplog
, you must create a full dump of a replica set member.mongodump
with--oplog
fails if you use any of the following options to limit the data to be dumped:See also
-
--dumpDbUsersAndRoles
¶
Includes user and role definitions in the database’s dump directory when performing
mongodump
on a specific database. This option applies only when you specify a database in the--db
option. MongoDB always includes user and role definitions whenmongodump
applies to an entire instance and not just a specific database.
-
--excludeCollection
=<string>
¶ Excludes the specified collection from the mongodump output. To exclude multiple collections, specify the
--excludeCollection
multiple times.
-
--excludeCollectionsWithPrefix
=<string>
¶ Excludes all collections with a specified prefix from the mongodump outputs. To specify multiple prefixes, specify the
--excludeCollectionsWithPrefix
multiple times.
-
--numParallelCollections
=<int>
,
-j
=<int>
¶ Default: 4
Number of collections mongodump should export in parallel.
-
--viewsAsCollections
¶
New in version 3.4.
When specified, mongodump exports read-only views as collections. For each view, mongodump will produce a BSON file containing the documents in the view. If you
mongorestore
the produced BSON file, the view will be restored as a collection.If you do not include
--viewsAsCollections
, mongodump captures each view’s metadata. If you include a view’s metadata file in amongorestore
operation, the view is recreated.
Examples¶
mongodump
a Collection¶
The following operation creates a dump file that contains only the
collection named records
in the database named test
. In
this case the database is running on the local interface on port
27017
:
mongodump
a Database Excluding Specified Collections¶
The following operation dumps all collections in the test
database
except for users
and salaries
:
mongodump
with Access Control¶
In the next example, mongodump
creates a database dump
located at /opt/backup/mongodump-2011-10-24
, from a database
running on port 37017
on the host mongodb1.example.net
and
authenticating using the username user
as follows:
If you do not include the --password
,
mongodump
prompts the user for the password.
Output to an Archive File¶
New in version 3.2.
To output the dump to an archive file, run mongodump
with the
--archive
option and the archive filename. For example, the following
operation creates a file test.20150715.archive
that contains the dump
of the test
database.
Output an Archive to Standard Output¶
New in version 3.2.
To output the archive to the standard output stream in order to pipe to
another process, run mongodump
with the archive
option but omit the filename:
Note
You cannot use the --archive
option with the
--out
option.
Compress the Output¶
To compress the files in the output dump directory, run
mongodump
with the new --gzip
option. For example,
the following operation outputs compressed files into the default
dump
directory.
To compress the archive file output by mongodump
, use the
--gzip
option in conjunction with the --archive
option, specifying the name of the compressed file.
Copy/Clone a Database¶
Starting in version 4.2, MongoDB removes the deprecated copydb
command and clone
command.
As an alternative, users can use mongodump
and
mongorestore
(with the mongorestore
options
--nsFrom
and --nsTo
).
For example, to copy the test
database from a local instance
running on the default port 27017 to the examples
database on the
same instance, you can:
Use
mongodump
to dump thetest
database to an archivemongodump-test-db
:Use
mongorestore
with--nsFrom
and--nsTo
to restore (with database name change) from the archive:
Tip
Include additional options as necessary, such as to specify the uri or host, username, password and authentication database.
Alternatively, instead of using an archive file, you can
mongodump
the test
database to the standard
output stream and pipe into mongorestore
: