Migrate from self-managed Neo4j to Aura

This tutorial describes how to migrate from a self-managed Neo4j database to Aura.

The minimum version of self-managed to upload to Aura is v5 LTS (5.26.7)

The Aura console only supports neo4j-admin database upload from versions 5.26.7 and later, 2025.04 and later. If your self-managed database is of an earlier version, you need to first update or migrate to at least 5.26.7.

Preparation

Aura instance size

Before starting, verify that the Aura instance you are migrating to is sized accordingly. The instance must be at least as large as your self-managed database to accommodate the data.

APOC compatibility

Aura contains most but not all functions and procedures contained in the APOC Core library. If you are using any APOC procedures and functions, make sure they are all available in Aura by checking the APOC support page.

Creating and uploading a database dump

In order to move data from your self-managed database to Aura, you need to create a dump of the existing database.

This process requires a short downtime for your self-managed database.

The following admin commands must be invoked with the same user as your self-managed Neo4j database. This guarantees that Neo4j has full rights to start and work with the database files you use.

  1. Stop the self-managed database you want to create a dump of, using the command STOP DATABASE neo4j in Cypher Shell or Browser.

  2. Ensure the target directory to store the database dumps (for instance /dumps/neo4j) exists.

  3. Depending on your self-managed Neo4j version, create a dump of your database (e.g. neo4j) using the neo4j-admin database dump command:

    bin/neo4j-admin database dump neo4j --to-path=/dumps/neo4j

    If your self-managed database is of version 4.4, you need to migrate to a later version before uploading to Aura. See the migration guide: Migrate databases from 4.4 LTS (EOL) for more information.

  4. Upload the database dump (e.g. neo4j) to your Aura instance (the Aura instance does not need to be stopped) using the neo4j-admin database upload command.

    bin/neo4j-admin database upload neo4j --from-path=/dumps/neo4j --to-uri=neo4j+s://xxxxxxxx.databases.neo4j.io --overwrite-destination=true