Restore a database dump

The neo4j-admin database load command can be used to load a database from an archive created with the neo4j-admin database dump command or a full backup artifact created by the neo4j-admin database backup command from Neo4j Enterprise.

If you are replacing an existing database on a standalone server, you have to shut it down before running the command and use the --overwrite-destination option.
Enterprise Edition If you are not replacing an existing database, you must create the database (using CREATE DATABASE against the system database) after the load operation finishes.

The command can be run from either an online or offline Neo4j DBMS on Enterprise edition. For Community edition, the command can be run only on an offline Neo4j DBMS. The command must be executed as the neo4j user to ensure the appropriate file permissions.

Change Data Capture does not capture any data changes resulting from the use of neo4j-admin database load. See Change Data Capture → Key considerations for more information.

Syntax

neo4j-admin database load [-h] [--expand-commands] [--info] [--verbose] [--overwrite-destination[=true|false]]
                          [--additional-config=<file>] [--from-path=<path> | --from-stdin] <database>

Description

Load a database from an archive. --from-path must be a directory containing an archive(s). An archive can be a database dump created with the dump command, or a full backup artifact created by the backup command in Neo4j Enterprise. If neither --from-path nor --from-stdin is supplied, the server.directories.dumps.root setting will be searched for the archive. Existing databases can be replaced by specifying --overwrite-destination. It is not possible to replace a database mounted on a running Neo4j server. The --info argument does not load the database. Instead, it prints information about the archive, such as file count, byte count, and format of the load file.

Parameters

Table 1. `neo4j-admin database load` parameters
Parameter	Description
`<database>`	Name of the database to load. Can contain * and ? for globbing. Note that * and ? have special meaning in some shells and might need to be escaped or used with quotes.

Options

Table 2. `neo4j-admin database load` options
Option	Description	Default
`--additional-config=<file>^[1]`	Configuration file with additional configuration.
`--expand-commands`	Allow command expansion in config value evaluation.
`--from-path=<path>`	Path to directory containing archive(s). It is possible to load databases from AWS S3 buckets, Google Cloud storage buckets, and Azure bucket using the appropriate URI as the path.
`--from-stdin`	Read archive from standard input.
`-h, --help`	Show this help message and exit.
`--info`	Print meta-data information about the archive file, instead of loading the contained database.
`--overwrite-destination[=true\|false]`	If an existing database should be replaced.	`false`
`--verbose`	Enable verbose output.
1. See `neo4j-admin` and `neo4j` tools → Configuration for details.

The --from-path=<path> option can also load databases from AWS S3 buckets, Google Cloud storage buckets, and Azure buckets. For more information, see Load a dump from a cloud storage.

Examples

The following examples demonstrate how to load a database dump (database.dump) created by the neo4j-admin database dump command, or a full backup artifact created by the neo4j-admin database backup command.

When replacing an existing database, you have to shut it down before running the command. The --overwrite-destination option is required because you are replacing the existing database.

If you are not replacing an existing database in Enterprise Edition, you must create the database (using CREATE DATABASE against the system database) after the load operation finishes.

neo4j-admin database load cannot be applied to Composite databases. It must be run directly on the databases that are associated with that Composite database.

Load a dump from a local directory

You can load a dump from a local directory using the following command:

bin/neo4j-admin database load --from-path=/full-path/data/dumps neo4j --overwrite-destination=true

You can use the same command to load the database from its full backup artifact:

bin/neo4j-admin database load --from-path=/full-path/to/backups neo4j --overwrite-destination=true

The following example shows how to designate a specific archive for the load command.

cat foo.dump | neo4j-admin database load --from-stdin mydatabase

Load a dump from a cloud storage

In Neo4j 2025.03, new cloud integration settings are introduced to provide better support for deployment and management in cloud ecosystems. For details, refer to Configuration settings → Cloud storage integration settings.

The following examples show how to load a database dump located in a cloud storage bucket using the --from-path option.

Neo4j uses the AWS SDK v2 to call the APIs on AWS using AWS URLs. Alternatively, you can override the endpoints so that the AWS SDK can communicate with alternative storage systems, such as Ceph, Minio, or LocalStack, using the system variables aws.endpointUrls3, aws.endpointUrlS3, or aws.endpointUrl, or the environments variables AWS_ENDPOINT_URL_S3 or AWS_ENDPOINT_URL.

Install the AWS CLI by following the instructions in the AWS official documentation — Install the AWS CLI version 2.
Create an S3 bucket and a directory to store the backup files using the AWS CLI:
```
aws s3 mb --region=us-east-1 s3://myBucket
aws s3api put-object --bucket myBucket --key myDirectory/
```
For more information on how to create a bucket and use the AWS CLI, see the AWS official documentation — Use Amazon S3 with the AWS CLI and Use high-level (s3) commands with the AWS CLI.
Verify that the ~/.aws/config file is correct by running the following command:
```
cat ~/.aws/config
```
The output should look like this:
```
[default]
region=us-east-1
```
Configure the access to your AWS S3 bucket by setting the aws_access_key_id and aws_secret_access_key in the ~/.aws/credentials file and, if needed, using a bucket policy. For example:
1. Use aws configure set aws_access_key_id aws_secret_access_key command to set your IAM credentials from AWS and verify that the ~/.aws/credentials is correct:
  cat ~/.aws/credentials
  The output should look like this:
  [default] aws_access_key_id=this.is.secret aws_secret_access_key=this.is.super.secret
2. Additionally, you can use a resource-based policy to grant access permissions to your S3 bucket and the objects in it. Create a policy document with the following content and attach it to the bucket. Note that both resource entries are important to be able to download and upload files.
  { "Version": "2012-10-17", "Id": "Neo4jBackupAggregatePolicy", "Statement": [ { "Sid": "Neo4jBackupAggregateStatement", "Effect": "Allow", "Action": [ "s3:ListBucket", "s3:GetObject", "s3:PutObject", "s3:DeleteObject" ], "Resource": [ "arn:aws:s3:::myBucket/*", "arn:aws:s3:::myBucket" ] } ] }
Run the neo4j-admin database load command to load a dump from your AWS S3 storage. The example assumes that you have dump artifacts located in the myBucket/myDirectory folder in your bucket.
```
bin/neo4j-admin database load mydatabase --from-path=s3://myBucket/myDirectory/ --overwrite-destination=true
```

Ensure you have a Google account and a project created in the Google Cloud Platform (GCP).
1. Install the gcloud CLI by following the instructions in the Google official documentation — Install the gcloud CLI.
2. Create a service account and a service account key using Google official documentation — Create service accounts and Creating and managing service account keys.
3. Download the JSON key file for the service account.
4. Set the GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS and GOOGLE_CLOUD_PROJECT environment variables to the path of the JSON key file and the project ID, respectively:
  export GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS="/path/to/keyfile.json" export GOOGLE_CLOUD_PROJECT=YOUR_PROJECT_ID
5. Authenticate the gcloud CLI with the e-mail address of the service account you have created, the path to the JSON key file, and the project ID:
  gcloud auth activate-service-account [email protected] --key-file=$GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS --project=$GOOGLE_CLOUD_PROJECT
  For more information, see the Google official documentation — gcloud auth activate-service-account.
6. Create a bucket in the Google Cloud Storage using Google official documentation — Create buckets.
7. Verify that the bucket is created by running the following command:
  gcloud storage ls
  The output should list the created bucket.
Run the neo4j-admin database load command to load a dump from your Google storage bucket. The example assumes that you have dump artifacts located in the myBucket/myDirectory folder in your bucket.
```
bin/neo4j-admin database load mydatabase --from-path=gs://myBucket/myDirectory/ --overwrite-destination=true
```

Ensure you have an Azure account, an Azure storage account, and a blob container.
1. You can create a storage account using the Azure portal.
  For more information, see the Azure official documentation on Create a storage account.
2. Create a blob container in the Azure portal.
  For more information, see the Azure official documentation on Quickstart: Upload, download, and list blobs with the Azure portal.
Install the Azure CLI by following the instructions in the Azure official documentation — Azure official documentation.
Authenticate the neo4j or neo4j-admin process against Azure using the default Azure credentials.
See the Azure official documentation on default Azure credentials for more information.
```
az login
```
Then you should be ready to use Azure URLs in either neo4j or neo4j-admin.

To validate that you have access to the container with your login credentials, run the following commands:

# Upload a file:
az storage blob upload --file someLocalFile  --account-name accountName - --container someContainer --name remoteFileName  --auth-mode login

# Download the file
az storage blob download  --account-name accountName --container someContainer --name remoteFileName --file downloadedFile --auth-mode login

# List container files
az storage blob list  --account-name someContainer --container someContainer  --auth-mode login

Run the neo4j-admin database load command to load a dump from your Azure blob storage container. The example assumes that you have dump artifacts located in the myStorageAccount/myContainer/myDirectory folder in your Azure account.
```
bin/neo4j-admin database load mydatabase --from-path=azb://myStorageAccount/myContainer/myDirectory --overwrite-destination=true
```

Restore a clustered database from a dump
Enterprise Edition

It is recommended to restore a clustered database from a dump using a URI approach. See Create a database from a URI for details.

When using the neo4j-admin database load command to seed a cluster, and a previous version of the database exists, you must delete it (using DROP DATABASE) first. If you fail to DROP the database, that database’s store files will be out of sync with its cluster state, potentially leading to logical corruptions. For more information, see Restore a database using a designated seeder.

Glossary

allocator: A component in the cluster that allocates databases to servers according to the topology constraints specified and an allocation strategy.
asynchronous replication: Asynchronous replication is used by secondary copies to poll for new transactions, which means they cannot be guaranteed to have received the most recent transactions. This enables efficient scale-out of read-performance.
Aura instance: A fully-managed DBMS represented by a single instance ID, that is running in the Neo4j Aura cloud.
auto-commit transaction: An automatically committed transaction that contains a single query.
Bolt protocol: Bolt is a protocol used for interaction between Neo4j instances and drivers.
bookmark: A marker the client can request from the cluster to ensure that it is able to read its own writes so that the application’s state is consistent and only databases that have a copy of the bookmark are permitted to respond.
category (Bloom): A category is based on a node label and is defined in a Perspective as a way of visually distinguishing nodes with the same label(s).
causal consistency: All servers in a cluster agree on the order in which transactions take place. The position of a server on the causal chain can be guaranteed using a bookmark.
cluster: A Neo4j DBMS that spans multiple servers working together to increase fault tolerance and/or read scalability. Databases on a cluster may be configured to replicate across servers in the cluster thus achieving read scalability or high availability.
client application: Software that interacts with a Neo4j server.
commit: A commit is the successful completion of a transaction, which ensures durability of any changes made. For more details, visit Operations Manual → Transaction management.
composite database: Composite databases are the means to access partitioned graph data with a single Cypher query.
constraint: Constraints are sets of data modeling rules that ensure the data is consistent and reliable.
Cypher®: Neo4j’s graph query language.
data model: A data model defines how information is organized in a database. A good data model will make querying and understanding your data easier. In Neo4j, the data models have a graph structure.
database: A database is a container used by the DBMS to manage and store graph data. The physical structure of data is controlled by the database.
database vs graph: Databases are the physical containers of graph data. Graphs are the logical structure of data in Neo4j.
Database Management System: Database Management System, or DBMS, capable of managing multiple databases. A DBMS may run on a single server, or span several servers configured as a cluster.
database schema: The prescribed property existence and datatypes for nodes and relationships.
deallocate: An act of removing a database from a server or a server from a cluster without loss of data or reduced fault tolerance.
degree (of a node): The number of relationships of a specific node; loops are counted twice.
disaster recovery: A manual intervention to restore availability of a cluster, or databases within a cluster.
driver: A software library that provides access to Neo4j from a particular programming language.
election: In the event that the Raft leader becomes unresponsive, followers automatically trigger an election and vote for a new leader.
entity: A node or a relationship.
expression (Cypher): A component of a Cypher query which produces values. It may be used in projections, as a predicate, or when setting properties on graph elements.
fabric: Fabric is the architectural design of a unified system that provides a single access point to local or distributed graph data.
fault tolerance: A guarantee that a cluster can maintain a database’s persistence and availability in the event of one or more servers failing.
follower: A primary copy of a database acting as a follower, receives and acknowledges synchronous writes from the leader.
Generative AI (GenAI): A type of artificial intelligence (AI) system that generates text, images, or other media in response to prompts.
graph: A logical representation of a set of nodes where some pairs are connected by relationships.
index: Data structure that improves read performance of a database.
knowledge graph: A specific type of graph that has an organizing principle so that a user (or a computer system) can reason about the underlying data. The organizing principle provides an additional layer of structure that adds context to support knowledge discovery.
label: Marks a node as a member of a named and indexed subset. A node may be assigned zero or more labels.
leader: A single primary copy of a database is designated as the leader. It receives all write transactions from clients and replicates writes synchronously to followers and asynchronously to secondary copies of the database.
main database: In terms of Neo4j Enterprise Studio, the database(s) containing the user’s data. Can exist in the same Neo4j deployment as the tool asset database.
motif: A description of a specific pattern within a graph.
node: A node represents an entity or discrete object in your graph data model. Nodes can be connected by relationships, hold data in properties, and are classified by labels.
operator: A symbol representing a mathematical or logical operation.
parameter: Named value provided when running a Cypher statement.
path: A sequence of nodes and the relationships connecting them, that does not contain duplicate relationships. Several paths can match a pattern.
pattern: A specific arrangement of nodes and relationships that can be matched in a graph. A pattern follows a motif.
perspective (Bloom): A Perspective defines a certain business view or domain that can be found in the target Neo4j graph. A single Neo4j graph can be viewed through different Perspectives, each tailored for a different business purpose.
primary: A copy of the database that is able to process write transactions and is eligible to be elected as a leader. It participates in fault tolerant writes as it is part of the majority required to acknowledge and commit write transactions.
primary vs secondary: In a cluster, databases can operate in either primary or secondary mode. Primary databases are able to process write and read transactions, ensuring fault tolerance. Secondary databases are replicated asynchronously from primaries, and their main purpose is to provide read scaling within the cluster.
project (Aura): An isolated environment in the unified Aura console that contains its own database instances, configurations, and resources. Preceded by tenant in the classic Aura console.
property: Properties are key-value pairs that are used for storing data on nodes and relationships.
query (Cypher): A statement that retrieves or writes information to a database.
Raft group: A group of servers that are participating in hosting a particular database in primary mode.
Raft group member: A server that is participating in a Raft group. A server can be a member of one or more groups.
Raft log: A shared log between all Raft group members that is guaranteed to be consistently updated and viewed by those members. The log contains both database data and operational state of the Raft group.
Raft protocol: The networking mechanism that enables a database to replicate its data across multiple servers to give high availability for accessing the data and high durability to the data stored.
read scaling: Distributing query load by creating additional database copies hosted in secondary mode (read-only).
relationship: A relationship represents a connection between nodes in your graph data model. Relationships connect a source node to a target node, hold data in properties, and are classified by type.
secondary: An asynchronously replicated copy of the database that provides read scaling within the cluster.
seed: A seed is a database dump or a full backup used to create a database on a cluster. This is sometimes called seeding.
server: A physical machine, a virtual machine, or a container running an instance of Neo4j. Servers can be standalone or part of a cluster.
session: A causally linked sequence of transactions.
session consistency: An alternative name for Neo4j’s causal consistency.
standalone: A single server running Neo4j and not part of a cluster.
synchronous replication: Synchronous replication requires the leader primary to replicate a transaction and block the commit until a quorum of the follower primaries acknowledges that the transaction is successfully replicated. Once the transaction is replicated, the commit is allowed to proceed. This ensures data durability and consistency within the cluster.
system database: A database used by Neo4j to store system information.
tenant (Aura): An isolated environment in the classic Aura console that contains its own database instances, configurations, and resources. Replaced by project in the unified Aura console.
tool asset database: In terms of Neo4j Enterprise Studio, the database where tools' assets are stored. This can be in the same Neo4j deployment as the main database(s) or in a separate deployment.
topology: A configuration that describes how the copies of a database should be spread across the servers in a cluster, see primary mode and secondary mode.
transaction: A transaction comprises a unit of work performed against a database. It is treated in a coherent and reliable way, independent of other transactions. Transactions comply with the ACID consistency model (atomic, consistent, isolated, and durable).