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$graphLookup (aggregation stage)

Definition

$graphLookup

Changed in version 5.1.

Performs a recursive search on a collection, with options for restricting the search by recursion depth and query filter.

The $graphLookup search process is summarized below:

Input documents flow into the $graphLookup stage of an aggregation operation.
$graphLookup targets the search to the collection designated by the from parameter (see below for full list of search parameters).
For each input document, the search begins with the value designated by startWith.
$graphLookup matches the startWith value against the field designated by connectToField in other documents in the from collection.
For each matching document, $graphLookup takes the value of the connectFromField and checks every document in the from collection for a matching connectToField value. For each match, $graphLookup adds the matching document in the from collection to an array field named by the as parameter.
This step continues recursively until no more matching documents are found, or until the operation reaches a recursion depth specified by the maxDepth parameter. $graphLookup then appends the array field to the input document. $graphLookup returns results after completing its search on all input documents.

$graphLookup has the following prototype form:

{
   $graphLookup: {
      from: <collection>,
      startWith: <expression>,
      connectFromField: <string>,
      connectToField: <string>,
      as: <string>,
      maxDepth: <number>,
      depthField: <string>,
      restrictSearchWithMatch: <document>
   }
}

$graphLookup takes a document with the following fields:

Field

Description

from

Target collection for the $graphLookup operation to search, recursively matching the connectFromField to the connectToField. The from collection must be in the same database as any other collections used in the operation.

Starting in MongoDB 5.1, the collection specified in the from parameter can be sharded.

startWith

Expression that specifies the value of the connectFromField with which to start the recursive search. If startWith evaluates to an array, $graphLookup performs the search simultaneously from all array elements.

connectFromField

Field name whose value $graphLookup uses to recursively match against the connectToField of other documents in the collection. If the value is an array, each element is individually followed through the traversal process.

connectToField

Field name in other documents against which to match the value of the field specified by the connectFromField parameter.

as

Name of the array field added to each output document. Contains the documents traversed in the $graphLookup stage to reach the document.

Documents returned in the as field are not guaranteed to be in any order.

maxDepth

Optional. Non-negative integral number specifying the maximum recursion depth.

depthField

Optional. Name of the field to add to each traversed document in the search path. The value of this field is the recursion depth for the document, represented as a NumberLong. Recursion depth value starts at zero, so the first lookup corresponds to zero depth.

restrictSearchWithMatch

Optional. A document specifying additional conditions for the recursive search. The syntax is identical to query filter syntax.

You cannot use any aggregation expression in this filter. For example, you can't use the following document to find documents in which the lastName value is different from the lastName value of the input document:

{ lastName: { $ne: "$lastName" } }

You can't use the document in this context, because "$lastName" will act as a string literal, not a field path.

Considerations

Sharded Collections

Starting in MongoDB 5.1, you can specify sharded collections in the from parameter of $graphLookup stages.

You cannot use the $graphLookup stage within a transaction while targeting a sharded collection.

Max Depth

Setting the maxDepth field to 0 is equivalent to a non-recursive $graphLookup search stage.

Memory

The $graphLookup stage must stay within the 100 megabyte memory limit. If allowDiskUse: true is specified for the aggregate() operation, the $graphLookup stage ignores the option. If there are other stages in the aggregate() operation, allowDiskUse: true option is in effect for these other stages.

See aggregration pipeline limitations for more information.

Unsorted Results

The $graphLookup stage does not return sorted results. To sort your results, use the $sortArray operator.

Views and Collation

If performing an aggregation that involves multiple views, such as with $lookup or $graphLookup, the views must have the same collation.

Examples

Within a Single Collection

A collection named employees has the following documents:

db.employees.insertMany( [
   { _id: 1, name: "Dev" },
   { _id: 2, name: "Eliot", reportsTo: "Dev" },
   { _id: 3, name: "Ron", reportsTo: "Eliot" },
   { _id: 4, name: "Andrew", reportsTo: "Eliot" },
   { _id: 5, name: "Asya", reportsTo: "Ron" },
   { _id: 6, name: "Dan", reportsTo: "Andrew" }
] )

The following $graphLookup operation recursively matches on the reportsTo and name fields in the employees collection, returning the reporting hierarchy for each person:

db.employees.aggregate( [
   {
      $graphLookup: {
         from: "employees",
         startWith: "$reportsTo",
         connectFromField: "reportsTo",
         connectToField: "name",
         as: "reportingHierarchy"
      }
   }
] )

The output resembles the following results:

{
   _id: 1,
   name: "Dev",
   reportingHierarchy: [ ]
}
{
   _id: 2,
   name: "Eliot",
   reportsTo: "Dev",
   reportingHierarchy : [
      { _id: 1, name: "Dev" }
   ]
}
{
   _id: 3,
   name: "Ron",
   reportsTo: "Eliot",
   reportingHierarchy: [
      { _id: 2, name: "Eliot", reportsTo: "Dev" },
      { _id: 1, name: "Dev" }
   ]
}
{
   _id: 4,
   name: "Andrew",
   reportsTo: "Eliot",
   reportingHierarchy: [
      { _id: 2, name: "Eliot", reportsTo: "Dev" },
      { _id: 1, name: "Dev" }
   ]
}
{
   _id: 5,
   name: "Asya",
   reportsTo: "Ron",
   reportingHierarchy: [
      { _id: 2, name: "Eliot", reportsTo: "Dev" },
      { _id: 3, name: "Ron", reportsTo: "Eliot" },
      { _id: 1, name: "Dev" }
   ]
}
{
   "_id" : 6,
   "name" : "Dan",
   "reportsTo" : "Andrew",
   "reportingHierarchy" : [
      { _id: 4, name: "Andrew", reportsTo: "Eliot" },
      { _id: 2, name: "Eliot", reportsTo: "Dev" },
      { _id: 1, name: "Dev" }
   ]
}

The following table provides a traversal path for the document { "_id" : 5, "name" : "Asya", "reportsTo" : "Ron" }:

Start value

The reportsTo value of the document:

{ ... reportsTo: "Ron" }

Depth 0

{ _id: 3, name: "Ron", reportsTo: "Eliot" }

Depth 1

{ _id: 2, name: "Eliot", reportsTo: "Dev" }

Depth 2

{ _id: 1, name: "Dev" }

The output generates the hierarchy Asya -> Ron -> Eliot -> Dev.

Across Multiple Collections

Like $lookup, $graphLookup can access another collection in the same database.

For example, create a database with two collections:

An airports collection with the following documents:

db.airports.insertMany( [
   { _id: 0, airport: "JFK", connects: [ "BOS", "ORD" ] },
   { _id: 1, airport: "BOS", connects: [ "JFK", "PWM" ] },
   { _id: 2, airport: "ORD", connects: [ "JFK" ] },
   { _id: 3, airport: "PWM", connects: [ "BOS", "LHR" ] },
   { _id: 4, airport: "LHR", connects: [ "PWM" ] }
] )

A travelers collection with the following documents:
```
db.travelers.insertMany( [
   { _id: 1, name: "Dev", nearestAirport: "JFK" },
   { _id: 2, name: "Eliot", nearestAirport: "JFK" },
   { _id: 3, name: "Jeff", nearestAirport: "BOS" }
] )
```

For each document in the travelers collection, the following aggregation operation looks up the nearestAirport value in the airports collection and recursively matches the connects field to the airport field. The operation specifies a maximum recursion depth of 2.

db.travelers.aggregate( [
   {
      $graphLookup: {
         from: "airports",
         startWith: "$nearestAirport",
         connectFromField: "connects",
         connectToField: "airport",
         maxDepth: 2,
         depthField: "numConnections",
         as: "destinations"
      }
   }
] )

The output resembles the following results:

{
   _id: 1,
   name: "Dev",
   nearestAirport: "JFK",
   destinations: [
      { _id: 3,
        airport: "PWM",
        connects: [ "BOS", "LHR" ],
        numConnections: Long(2) },
      { _id: 2,
        airport: "ORD",
        connects: [ "JFK" ],
        numConnections: Long(1) },
      { _id: 1,
        airport: "BOS",
        connects: [ "JFK", "PWM" ],
        numConnections: Long(1) },
      { _id: 0,
        airport: "JFK",
        connects: [ "BOS", "ORD" ],
        numConnections: Long(0) }
   ]
}
{
   _id: 2,
   name: "Eliot",
   nearestAirport: "JFK",
   destinations: [
      { _id: 3,
        airport: "PWM",
        connects: [ "BOS", "LHR" ],
        numConnections: Long(2) },
      { _id: 2,
        airport: "ORD",
        connects: [ "JFK" ],
        numConnections: Long(1) },
      { _id: 1,
        airport: "BOS",
        connects: [ "JFK", "PWM" ],
        numConnections: Long(1) },
      { _id: 0,
        airport: "JFK",
        connects: [ "BOS", "ORD" ],
        numConnections: Long(0) } ]
}
{
   "_id" : 3,
   name: "Jeff",
   nearestAirport: "BOS",
   destinations: [
      { _id: 2,
        airport: "ORD",
        connects: [ "JFK" ],
        numConnections: Long(2) },
      { _id: 3,
        airport: "PWM",
        connects: [ "BOS", "LHR" ],
        numConnections: Long(1) },
      { _id: 4,
        airport: "LHR",
        connects: [ "PWM" ],
        numConnections: Long(2) },
      { _id:: 0,
        airport: "JFK",
        connects: [ "BOS", "ORD" ],
        numConnections: Long(1) },
      { _id:: 1,
        airport: "BOS",
        connects: [ "JFK", "PWM" ],
        numConnections: Long(0) }
   ]
}

The following table provides a traversal path for the recursive search, up to depth 2, where the starting airport is JFK:

Start value

The nearestAirport value from the travelers collection:

{ ... nearestAirport: "JFK" }

Depth 0

{ _id: 0, airport: "JFK", connects: [ "BOS", "ORD" ] }

Depth 1

{ _id: 1, airport: "BOS", connects: [ "JFK", "PWM" ] }
{ _id: 2, airport: "ORD", connects: [ "JFK" ] }

Depth 2

{ _id: 3, airport: "PWM", connects: [ "BOS", "LHR" ] }

With a Query Filter

The following example uses a collection with a set of documents containing names of people along with arrays of their friends and their hobbies. An aggregation operation finds one particular person and traverses her network of connections to find people who list golf among their hobbies.

A collection named people contains the following documents:

db.people.insertMany( [
   {
      _id: 1,
      name: "Tanya Jordan",
      friends: [ "Shirley Soto", "Terry Hawkins", "Carole Hale" ],
      hobbies: [ "tennis", "unicycling", "golf" ]
   },
   {
      _id: 2,
      name: "Carole Hale",
      friends: [ "Joseph Dennis", "Tanya Jordan", "Terry Hawkins" ],
      hobbies: [ "archery", "golf", "woodworking" ]
   },
   {
      _id: 3,
      name: "Terry Hawkins",
      friends: [ "Tanya Jordan", "Carole Hale", "Angelo Ward" ],
      hobbies: [ "knitting", "frisbee" ]
   },
   {
      _id: 4,
      name: "Joseph Dennis",
      friends: [ "Angelo Ward", "Carole Hale" ],
      hobbies: [ "tennis", "golf", "topiary" ]
   },
   {
      _id: 5,
      name: "Angelo Ward",
      friends: [ "Terry Hawkins", "Shirley Soto", "Joseph Dennis" ],
      hobbies: [ "travel", "ceramics", "golf" ]
      },
      {
         _id: 6,
         name: "Shirley Soto",
         friends: [ "Angelo Ward", "Tanya Jordan", "Carole Hale" ],
         hobbies: [ "frisbee", "set theory" ]
   }
] )

The following aggregation operation uses three stages:

$match matches on documents with a name field containing the string "Tanya Jordan". Returns one output document.
$graphLookup connects the output document's friends field with the name field of other documents in the collection to traverse Tanya Jordan's network of connections. This stage uses the restrictSearchWithMatch parameter to find only documents in which the hobbies array contains golf. Returns one output document.
$project shapes the output document. The names listed in connections who play golf are taken from the name field of the documents listed in the input document's golfers array.

db.people.aggregate( [
  { $match: { "name": "Tanya Jordan" } },
  { $graphLookup: {
      from: "people",
      startWith: "$friends",
      connectFromField: "friends",
      connectToField: "name",
      as: "golfers",
      restrictSearchWithMatch: { "hobbies" : "golf" }
    }
  },
  { $project: {
      "name": 1,
      "friends": 1,
      "connections who play golf": "$golfers.name"
    }
  }
] )

The operation returns the following document:

{
   _id: 1,
   name: "Tanya Jordan",
   friends: [
      "Shirley Soto",
      "Terry Hawkins",
      "Carole Hale"
   ],
   'connections who play golf': [
      "Joseph Dennis",
      "Tanya Jordan",
      "Angelo Ward",
      "Carole Hale"
   ]
}

A collection named employees has the following documents:

{ _id: 1, name: "Dev" },
{ _id: 2, name: "Eliot", reportsTo: "Dev" },
{ _id: 3, name: "Ron", reportsTo: "Eliot" },
{ _id: 4, name: "Andrew", reportsTo: "Eliot" },
{ _id: 5, name: "Asya", reportsTo: "Ron" },
{ _id: 6, name: "Dan", reportsTo: "Andrew" }

The following Employee class models documents in the employees collection:

public class Employee
{
    public ObjectId Id { get; set; }
    public string Name { get; set; }
    public Employee ReportsTo { get; set; }
    public List<Employee> ReportingHierarchy { get; set; }
    
    public List<string> Hobbies { get; set; }
}

To use the MongoDB .NET/C# driver to add a $graphLookup stage to an aggregation pipeline, call the GraphLookup() method on a PipelineDefinition object.

The following example creates a pipeline stage that recursively matches on the ReportsTo and Name fields in the employees collection, returning the reporting hierarchy for each person:

var pipeline = new EmptyPipelineDefinition<Employee>()
    .GraphLookup<Employee, Employee, Employee, Employee, string, Employee, List<Employee>, Employee>(
        from: employeeCollection,
        connectFromField: e => e.ReportsTo,
        connectToField: e => e.Name,
        startWith: e => e.ReportsTo,
        @as: e => e.ReportingHierarchy);

You can use an AggregateGraphLookupOptions object to specify the depth to recurse and name of the depth field. The following code example performs the same $graphLookup operation as the previous example, but specifies a maximum recursion depth of 1:

var employeeCollection = client.GetDatabase("aggregation_examples").GetCollection<Employee>("employees");
var pipeline = new EmptyPipelineDefinition<Employee>()
    .GraphLookup<Employee, Employee, Employee, Employee, string, Employee, List<Employee>, Employee>(
        from: employeeCollection,
        connectFromField: e => e.ReportsTo,
        connectToField: e => e.Name,
        startWith: e => e.ReportsTo,
        @as: e => e.ReportingHierarchy,
        new AggregateGraphLookupOptions<Employee, Employee, Employee>
        {
            MaxDepth = 1
        });

You can also use an AggregateGraphLookupOptions object to specify a filter that documents must match in order for MongoDB to include them in your search. The following code example performs the same $graphLookup operation as the previous examples, but includes only Employee documents where the Hobbies field contains "golf":

var employeeCollection = client.GetDatabase("aggregation_examples").GetCollection<Employee>("employees");
var pipeline = new EmptyPipelineDefinition<Employee>()
    .GraphLookup<Employee, Employee, Employee, Employee, string, Employee, List<Employee>, Employee>(
        from: employeeCollection,
        connectFromField: e => e.ReportsTo,
        connectToField: e => e.Name,
        startWith: e => e.ReportsTo,
        @as: e => e.ReportingHierarchy,
        new AggregateGraphLookupOptions<Employee, Employee, Employee>
        {
            MaxDepth = 1,
            RestrictSearchWithMatch = Builders<Employee>.Filter.AnyEq(e => e.Hobbies, "golf") 
        });

A collection named employees has the following documents:

db.employees.insertMany([
  { _id: 1, name: "Dev" },
  { _id: 2, name: "Eliot", reportsTo: "Dev" },
  { _id: 3, name: "Ron", reportsTo: "Eliot" },
  { _id: 4, name: "Andrew", reportsTo: "Eliot" },
  { _id: 5, name: "Asya", reportsTo: "Ron" },
  { _id: 6, name: "Dan", reportsTo: "Andrew" }
]);

To use the MongoDB Node.js driver to add a $graphLookup stage to an aggregation pipeline, use the $graphLookup operator in a pipeline object.

The following example creates a pipeline stage that recursively matches the reportsTo fields to the name fields in the employees collection, returning the reporting hierarchy for each person in a new field named reportingHierarchy. The example then runs the aggregation pipeline:

const pipeline = [
  {
    $graphLookup: {
      from: "employees",
      connectFromField: "reportsTo",
      connectToField: "name",
      startWith: "$reportsTo",
      as: "reportingHierarchy"
    }
  }
];
const cursor = collection.aggregate(pipeline);
return cursor;

To specify the depth of the recursion, use the maxDepth field. The following code example performs the same $graphLookup operation as the previous example, but specifies a maximum recursion depth of 1:

const pipeline = [
  {
    $graphLookup: {
      from: "employees",
      connectFromField: "reportsTo",
      connectToField: "name",
      startWith: "$reportsTo",
      as: "reportingHierarchy",
      maxDepth: 1
    }
  }
];
const cursor = collection.aggregate(pipeline);
return cursor;

To specify a filter that documents must match for the operation to include them in the search results, use the restrictSearchWithMatch field. The following code example performs the same $graphLookup operation as the previous examples, but includes only employee documents where the hobbies field contains "golf":

const pipeline = [
  {
    $graphLookup: {
      from: "employees",
      connectFromField: "reportsTo",
      connectToField: "name",
      startWith: "$reportsTo",
      as: "reportingHierarchy",
      maxDepth: 1,
      restrictSearchWithMatch: { hobbies: "golf" }
    }
  }
];
const cursor = collection.aggregate(pipeline);
return cursor;

Learn More

To learn more about how to use $graphLookup, see Webinar: Working with Graph Data in MongoDB.

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