How to print out more than 20 items (documents) in MongoDB's shell?

Question

db.foo.find().limit(300)

won't do it. It still prints out only 20 documents.

db.foo.find().toArray()
db.foo.find().forEach(printjson)

will both print out very expanded view of each document instead of the 1-line version for find():

By default mongo shell print only first 20 documents, you can get next batch 20 documents by typing `Type it` in the shell. And so on. — roottraveller, Feb 13 '19 at 04:18

score 462 · Accepted Answer · edited Nov 26 '22 at 21:28

462

DBQuery.shellBatchSize = 300

MongoDB Docs - Configure the mongo Shell - Change the mongo Shell Batch Size

edited Nov 26 '22 at 21:28

hnwoh

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answered Sep 14 '10 at 01:45

Thilo

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Is there a way to make this persistent? – Lukasz Wiktor Jun 21 '16 at 12:20
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@LukaszWiktor yes, you can create a $HOME/.mongorc.js file and put that shellBatchSize setting in there. mine has the query batch size setting and rs.slaveOk() enabled. it's usage is also slightly different when using --eval via commandline. see: https://docs.mongodb.com/manual/mongo/#mongorc-js-file – matias elgart Dec 03 '16 at 17:56
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the link is outdated, it contains no such information. Also, can I pass this as an environment variable? – phil294 Dec 05 '19 at 10:08
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In case you want to run this from a command shell, you can do it like this: `mongo --eval "DBQuery.shellBatchSize = 100; db.foo.find()"` – Jelle Sep 29 '20 at 08:06
A couple of answers below now mention that `DBQuery.shellBatchSize` is deprecated, and `config.set("displayBatchSize", 300)` should be used instead. – mwfearnley Jul 05 '23 at 12:13

score 222 · Answer 2 · edited Jun 19 '21 at 05:25

222

From the shell you can use:

db.collection.find().toArray()

to display all documents without having to use it.

edited Jun 19 '21 at 05:25

Xavier Guihot

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answered Feb 23 '11 at 17:56

Sridhar

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This. If you just want them all in a shell so you can cut and paste, this is sufficient. – superluminary Aug 04 '16 at 10:43
This is exactly what did it for me. Truth be told I just needed a way to save all results from Robomongo output. Thank you! – Andrés Botero Jun 19 '17 at 19:21
That's great, and it also let me pipe the result to jq :) – Omer van Kloeten Aug 20 '17 at 12:28
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Awesome in conjunction with _Tee_ for a quick export: `mongo | tee ./myOutput.txt` – Metafaniel Jul 10 '20 at 21:51
This is exactly what the question asker said they did _not_ want to do, since it outputs the results differently. – M. Justin Jun 16 '23 at 15:48

score 85 · Answer 3 · answered Sep 14 '10 at 01:23

85

You can use it inside of the shell to iterate over the next 20 results. Just type it if you see "has more" and you will see the next 20 items.

answered Sep 14 '10 at 01:23

halfdan

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oh it is really about how to print out all without using `it` – nonopolarity Sep 14 '10 at 01:37
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The whole idea is NOT to use the iterator – Amir Kost Sep 18 '16 at 16:45
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I downvoted because this is what the OP wanted to avoid (which is the default behaviour). – crafter Aug 31 '17 at 10:13

Wilfred Knievel · Answer 4 · 2012-03-28T16:54:46.007

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Could always do:

db.foo.find().forEach(function(f){print(tojson(f, '', true));});

To get that compact view.

Also, I find it very useful to limit the fields returned by the find so:

db.foo.find({},{name:1}).forEach(function(f){print(tojson(f, '', true));});

which would return only the _id and name field from foo.

edited Mar 28 '12 at 16:54

answered Sep 30 '11 at 09:29

Wilfred Knievel

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I like this way becase it can be running in shell script ( mongo client with `--eval` ) – Zheng Kai Sep 26 '13 at 03:21
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@ZhengKai if you're using a script and not in the shell then shellBatchSize is not relevant as your results won't be iterated over for you by the shell, you'll have to do it yourself. – Asya Kamsky Nov 06 '13 at 04:36
The tojson() was exactly what I was looking for to convert it from DBQuery thank you! – Mark Pieszak - Trilon.io Oct 26 '15 at 17:10

score 16 · Answer 5 · answered Sep 14 '21 at 09:47

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With newer version of mongo shell (mongosh) use following syntax:

config.set("displayBatchSize", 300)

instead of depreciated:

DBQuery.shellBatchSize = 300

Future find() or aggregate() operations will only return 300 documents per cursor iteration.

answered Sep 14 '21 at 09:47

seven

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score 7 · Answer 6 · answered Nov 19 '18 at 08:52

I suggest you to have a ~/.mongorc.js file so you do not have to set the default size everytime.

 # execute in your terminal
 touch ~/.mongorc.js
 echo 'DBQuery.shellBatchSize = 100;' > ~/.mongorc.js
 # add one more line to always prettyprint the ouput
 echo 'DBQuery.prototype._prettyShell = true; ' >> ~/.mongorc.js

To know more about what else you can do, I suggest you to look at this article: http://mo.github.io/2017/01/22/mongo-db-tips-and-tricks.html

N.Mehralizadeh · Answer 7 · 2023-02-28T15:33:38.153

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DBQuery.shellBatchSize is deprecated and you need to use another command instead of this called config.set("displayBatchSize").

Example:

config.set("displayBatchSize", 300)

Configure Settings Using the API — MongoDB Shell

edited Feb 28 '23 at 15:33

answered Feb 28 '23 at 15:30

N.Mehralizadeh

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score 0 · Answer 8 · answered Jul 18 '17 at 17:54

In the mongo shell, if the returned cursor is not assigned to a variable using the var keyword, the cursor is automatically iterated to access up to the first 20 documents that match the query. You can set the DBQuery.shellBatchSize variable to change the number of automatically iterated documents.

Reference - https://docs.mongodb.com/v3.2/reference/method/db.collection.find/

score -1 · Answer 9 · answered Jun 15 '21 at 10:56

show dbs

use your database name in my case, I'm using - use smartbank then - show collections - just to check the document collections name. and finally, db. your collection name.find() or find({}) -

show dbs

use smartbank

show collections

db.users.find() or db.users.find({}) or db.users.find({_id: ObjectId("60c8823cbe9c1c21604f642b")}) or db.users.find({}).limit(20)

you can specify _id:ObjectId(write the document id here) to get the single document

or you can specify limit - db.users.find({}).limit(20)

How to print out more than 20 items (documents) in MongoDB's shell?

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