Let’s see how to backup the MongoDB database with DigitalOcean in this article. At Bobcares, with our DigitalOcean Managed Services, we can handle your DigitalOcean – MongoDB issues.

Backup MongoDB Database with DigitalOcean

In terms of NoSQL database engines, MongoDB is one of the most well-liked. Scalability, reliability, toughness, and usability are its most renowned strengths. We will backup and restore a sample MongoDB database in this article.

Prerequisites

Ubuntu 18.04 Droplet, MongoDB installed and configured, Sample MongoDB database imported.

Backup Process

We can use the

mongodumpCopy Code

command to create a data backup. The

--dbCopy Code

argument, which specifies the name of the database we want to back up, is a crucial part of the

mongodumpCopy Code

command. The

mongodumpCopy Code

command backs up all the databases if we don’t specify a database name. The

--outCopy Code

argument, which specifies the directory into which the data will be written, is the second crucial argument.

Let’s back up the

newCopy Code

database, for instance, and store the backup file in the

/var/backups/mongobackupsCopy Code

directory. Our backups will store in the directory with the current date, such as

/var/backups/mongobackups/MM-DD-YYCopy Code

.

1. Firstly, create that directory.

   $ sudo mkdir /var/backups/mongobackups
2. Now run

   mongodumpCopy Code

   .

   $ sudo mongodump --db new --out /var/backups/mongobackups/`date +"%m-%d-%y"`
3. The result will look like this:

   2020-10-29T19:22:36.886+0000    writing new.restaurants to
   2020-10-29T19:22:36.969+0000    done dumping new.restaurants (25359 documents)Copy Code

    

   Note that we used

   date +"%m-%d-%y"Copy Code

   to obtain the current date in the directory path mentioned above. As a result, we will be able to store backups in a directory like

   /var/backups/date/Copy Code

   . This is especially practical when we automate the backups.

   The

   newCopy Code

   database is currently fully backed up and can be found in the location

   /var/backups/mongobackups/date/new/Copy Code

   . Everything needed to successfully restore the

   newCopy Code

     database is present in this backup.

   Generally speaking, we ought to perform regular backups, ideally when the server is the least busy. As a result, we can configure the

   mongodumpCopy Code

   command as a cron job to execute regularly.
4. To do this, launch the cron editor and open crontab.

   $ sudo crontab -e
5. Enter the

   mongodumpCopy Code

   command as follows inside the crontab prompt:

   3 3 * * * mongodump --out /var/backups/mongobackups/`date +"%m-%d-%y"`Copy Code

    

This will have all of the databases backed up.

How to delete old Backups?

Our Tech team always advises cleaning old backups as they may take up a lot of disk space. Use the bash command below to remove all backups older than seven days:

$ find /var/backups/mongobackups/ -mtime +7 -exec rm -rf {} \;

We can also perform this cleaning process as a cron job so that the removal of old backups will be done before the next backup. In order to do so:

1. Open the crontab and type the below command:

   $ sudo crontab -e
2. Then enter the line:

   3 1 * * * find /var/backups/mongobackups/ -mtime +7 -exec rm -rf {} \;Copy Code
3. Finally, save and close the file.

The MongoDB databases will have a reliable backup solution if we do all the actions in this step.

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Conclusion

In this article, we have provided the simple steps from our Support team to create a proper backup of the MongoDB database with DigitalOcean.