Instance management

As mentioned, an instance in Desktop represents a DBMS, which is a Neo4j server installation that contains a minimum of the system database and a default user database.

Create instance

When you open Desktop for the first time, you can use the Create instance button in the middle of your screen to add a new instance to your local environment. If you already have an instance and want to create another, the button is located in the upper right corner instead.

Figure 1. Create a new instance

You need to give your instance a name and select a Neo4j version. Desktop 2.0 supports DBMS versions 5.1 and later and default is the latest version. Keep in mind that if you select any version other than the default, Desktop needs to download resources and therefore you must be connected to the internet.

You also need to create a database user and password. The credentials apply to all databases within that instance.

Once you are satisfied with the details, you finalize with the Create button. Your new DBMS is visible shortly thereafter and is ready to be started momentarily.

Figure 2. A running instance

Start/stop instance

You can only have one instance running in Desktop. Use the play/stop button to start/stop instances. If you start an instance, any already running instance will be stopped automatically. Some operations require that your instance is stopped, such as loading and exporting databases.

Figure 3. Instance actions

Connect tools

The Connect dropdown on the instance card allows you to connect directly to either the Query or the Explore tool. The tools can only be connected to one database at the time and automatically selects the default database. You can switch both database and instance from inside the tool. See Explore and Query for more information about the built-in tools.

Manage instances

The instance management menu […] allows you to do a number of things:

Overview - View instance details such as Connection URI, version, and ID.
Plugins - Install one or more plugins.
Upgrade - Upgrade your instance to a later version of Neo4j.
Load database from file - Load your .dump, .tar, and .backup files directly. See Load a database.
Export databases - Export databases in your instance as a .dump file. See Export databases.
Open dumps folder - View your dumps folder directly from Desktop.
Open neo4j.log - View the log file in a new window.
Open neo4j.conf - Use your own editor/IDE to open and configure the neo4j.conf file.
Clone - Make a copy of your instance.
Migrate to Neo4j Aura - Learn what you need to do to move your data to the cloud-based Neo4j Aura.
Delete - Delete your instance and the databases it contains.

Install plugins

A plugin is additional functionality that can be enabled for a DBMS. With the latest version of Neo4j Desktop, the following plugins are available for installation for your local instance:

APOC - A library of user-defined procedures and functions to help with many different tasks in areas like data integration, graph algorithms or data conversion.
Bloom - Get some extra functionality using the Bloom plugin. A basic version is available as Explore in the Tools section.
Gen AI integrations - A Gen AI plugin that enables creating vector embeddings in your data for use with vector indexes and vector functions.
GDS Library - Common graph algorithms for Neo4j.

Upgrade instance

You can upgrade your local instances to a later version of Neo4j directly in from Desktop (i.e. this is not possible for remote instances). This action requires that the instance you want to upgrade is stopped.

From the instance management menu, select Upgrade and which version you want to upgrade to. Note that it is not possible to downgrade. Should the upgrade for some reason fail, a backup of the instance is taken and logs specific for the upgrade are provided.

Figure 4. Upgrade progress

Once the upgrade completes successfully, you can start the instance.

Clone instance

Use the Clone option to make a copy of an instance. The instance you want to clone needs to be stopped and you need to give the copy a unique name. The operation will fail if an instance in Desktop already exists with the same name. Once the cloning is complete, the new copy is listed along with your other instances.

Running instances simultaneously

As mentioned, you can only have one running instance in Desktop and you can only connect to a running instance. However, it is possible to connect to multiple instances as long as only one is local. In other words, you can connect to one local instance and multiple remote instances. In order to interact with the databases in your instances simultaneously, you need to have multiple Desktop windows open at the same time. This allows you to query and explore data in multiple databases without having to stop and start instances. To open new windows go to the File or Neoj Desktop 2 menu bar option and select New window. Keep in mind that you can only interact with one database per instance at a time.