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MongoDB Academy · Lesson

mongodump and mongorestore for Full Backups

Learners will create a full BSON dump of a database and restore it to a different cluster with mongorestore.

mongodump and mongorestore for Full Backups is a free MongoDB Academy lesson on CoddyKit — lesson 3 of 4. You can read the complete lesson below for free — then practise it hands-on in the browser with a built-in code editor and a 24/7 AI tutor. It is part of the MongoDB Academy learning path, one of 4 lessons in the course, and your progress syncs across the web and the CoddyKit app.

Why Use mongodump for Backups?

mongodump creates a binary BSON snapshot of a database or collection. Unlike mongoexport, which produces human-readable JSON, mongodump preserves all BSON type information exactly—ObjectIds, dates, decimals, binary data—with zero loss of fidelity. This makes it the correct tool for full database backups and migrations between MongoDB clusters, while mongoexport is better for selective data sharing.

Basic mongodump Usage

Running mongodump without arguments dumps all databases from the local MongoDB instance to a dump/ directory. Specify --uri, --db, and optionally --collection to narrow the scope. The output directory contains one subdirectory per database, each with .bson and .metadata.json files per collection.

# Dump the entire 'myapp' database
mongodump \
  --uri 'mongodb://localhost:27017' \
  --db myapp \
  --out /backups/myapp-2024-01-15

# Output structure:
# /backups/myapp-2024-01-15/
#   myapp/
#     users.bson
#     users.metadata.json
#     products.bson
#     products.metadata.json

Dumping a Single Collection

Use --collection to dump only one collection from a database. This produces a single .bson file and its corresponding .metadata.json (which stores index definitions). Targeted collection dumps are useful for extracting a single collection for migration without backing up the entire database.

# Dump only the 'orders' collection
mongodump \
  --uri 'mongodb://localhost:27017' \
  --db myapp \
  --collection orders \
  --out /backups/orders-backup

# Result: /backups/orders-backup/myapp/orders.bson
#         /backups/orders-backup/myapp/orders.metadata.json

Compressing the Dump

Large BSON dumps can consume significant disk space. Use --gzip to compress the output files as they are written. Each .bson file becomes a .bson.gz file, typically achieving 5-10x compression for typical document collections. Compression runs in the mongodump process and requires a matching --gzip flag in mongorestore to decompress.

# Create a compressed backup
mongodump \
  --uri 'mongodb://localhost:27017' \
  --db myapp \
  --gzip \
  --out /backups/myapp-compressed-2024-01-15

# Files are now .bson.gz:
# /backups/myapp-compressed-2024-01-15/myapp/users.bson.gz
# /backups/myapp-compressed-2024-01-15/myapp/orders.bson.gz

Archiving to a Single File

Use --archive to write the entire dump to a single archive file instead of a directory tree. You can also pipe it to gzip or aws s3 cp for one-step compressed backup and upload. This is the most compact and portable dump format for automating backups in CI or cron jobs.

# Archive + compress to a single file
mongodump \
  --uri 'mongodb://localhost:27017' \
  --db myapp \
  --archive=/backups/myapp-2024-01-15.archive.gz \
  --gzip

# Or pipe to gzip
mongodump \
  --uri 'mongodb://localhost:27017' \
  --db myapp \
  --archive | gzip > /backups/myapp-2024-01-15.gz

Basic mongorestore Usage

mongorestore reads a directory or archive created by mongodump and inserts the documents into a target MongoDB cluster. It recreates collections with their index definitions (from the .metadata.json files) after the data is loaded. Specify the target cluster with --uri and the source directory or archive with --dir or --archive.

# Restore the full myapp database from a directory backup
mongorestore \
  --uri 'mongodb://restore-target:27017' \
  --dir /backups/myapp-2024-01-15

# Restore a gzip-compressed directory backup
mongorestore \
  --uri 'mongodb://restore-target:27017' \
  --gzip \
  --dir /backups/myapp-compressed-2024-01-15

Restoring to a Different Database Name

By default, mongorestore restores to the same database name as in the dump. Use --nsFrom and --nsTo (namespace from/to) to restore to a different database or collection name. This is essential when cloning production data into a staging database with a different name.

# Restore 'myapp' from dump into 'myapp_staging'
mongorestore \
  --uri 'mongodb://localhost:27017' \
  --nsFrom 'myapp.*' \
  --nsTo 'myapp_staging.*' \
  --dir /backups/myapp-2024-01-15

The --drop Flag in Restore

Like mongoimport, mongorestore has a --drop flag that drops each collection before restoring it. Without --drop, mongorestore merges restored documents with any existing data—useful for partial restores. With --drop, you get a clean replacement of the collection, which is safer for full database restores to avoid stale data mixing with the backup.

# Drop and fully replace all collections during restore
mongorestore \
  --uri 'mongodb://localhost:27017' \
  --db myapp \
  --drop \
  --dir /backups/myapp-2024-01-15/myapp

Parallel Restore With --numParallelCollections

For databases with many collections, mongorestore can restore multiple collections in parallel. Use --numParallelCollections (default: 4) to increase parallelism on servers with high I/O capacity. More parallel restores reduce total restore time but increase memory and CPU usage on both the client and server.

# Restore 8 collections in parallel
mongorestore \
  --uri 'mongodb://restore-target:27017' \
  --dir /backups/myapp-2024-01-15 \
  --numParallelCollections 8

Backup Automation With a Cron Job

Automate daily backups by running a shell script from a cron job. The script creates a timestamped backup directory, runs mongodump, compresses the result, and optionally uploads it to S3 or another remote storage. Always verify the exit code of mongodump to detect failed backups before the previous backup is overwritten.

#!/bin/bash
DATE=$(date +%Y%m%d)
BACKUP_DIR="/backups/myapp-$DATE"

mongodump \
  --uri "$MONGO_URI" \
  --db myapp \
  --gzip \
  --out "$BACKUP_DIR"

if [ $? -eq 0 ]; then
  echo "Backup successful: $BACKUP_DIR"
else
  echo "Backup FAILED!"
  exit 1
fi

Point-in-Time Backups in Atlas

MongoDB Atlas provides automated Point-in-Time (PIT) backups that capture snapshots every 6 hours and allow restore to any second within the retention window (up to 35 days on M10+ tiers). Atlas backups do not use mongodump—they leverage filesystem-level snapshots at the storage engine level for zero-impact backups. For self-hosted MongoDB, mongodump is the primary backup mechanism, but it is a logical backup and cannot capture in-flight transactions.

Quick Check

Test your understanding of MongoDB & NoSQL Databases concepts from this lesson.

Lesson Recap

In this lesson you learned: mongodump creates binary BSON backups preserving all type information, mongorestore reads those dumps and recreates collections with their indexes, and --drop, --nsFrom/--nsTo, and --gzip are essential flags for production backup workflows. Next up we write Node.js seed scripts to programmatically load data into MongoDB during development.

Frequently asked questions

Is the “mongodump and mongorestore for Full Backups” lesson free?

Yes — the full text of “mongodump and mongorestore for Full Backups” is free to read here on the web, and the MongoDB Academy course includes 4 lessons in total. To practise it interactively (a built-in code editor and a 24/7 AI tutor) and unlock the rest of the MongoDB Academy course, upgrade to CoddyKit PRO.

What will I learn in “mongodump and mongorestore for Full Backups”?

Learners will create a full BSON dump of a database and restore it to a different cluster with mongorestore. You practise MongoDB Academy with hands-on code you run directly in the browser, and a 24/7 AI tutor answers your questions as you work through the lesson.

Do I need any experience to start MongoDB Academy?

No prior experience is required. MongoDB Academy on CoddyKit is structured for beginners through advanced learners; this is — lesson 3 of 4, so you can start here or from the beginning and move at your own pace.

How long does the “mongodump and mongorestore for Full Backups” lesson take?

Most CoddyKit lessons take about 5–10 minutes. Each one is bite-sized and interactive, so you make steady progress and pick up exactly where you left off across the web and the app.

Can I write and run code in this MongoDB Academy lesson?

Yes. Every MongoDB Academy lesson includes a built-in code editor, so you write and run real code right in your browser and get instant AI feedback — no local setup required.

All lessons in this course

  1. mongoimport: Loading JSON and CSV Files
  2. mongoexport: Dumping Collections to Files
  3. mongodump and mongorestore for Full Backups
  4. Seeding Data With Node.js Scripts
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