How do I copy a database from one MongoDB server to another?

In addition to the answer of Mike Shauneu, if your database name on the destination server is not the same as on the source server you need to rewrite the namespace. In combination with authentication I got this to work using the --uri option, which requires a recent mongo version (>3.4.6):

mongodump --uri="mongodb://$sourceUser:$sourcePwd@$sourceHost/$sourceDb" --gzip --archive | mongorestore --uri="mongodb://$targetUser:$targetPwd@$targetHost/$targetDb" --nsFrom="$sourceDb.*" --nsTo="$targetDb.*" --gzip --archive

Starting from Mongo version 3.2 you can do it by using mongodump/mongorestore:

mongodump  --host <from_host> --db <from_db> --archive | mongorestore --host <to_host> --archive

Additional info could be found at:

https://docs.mongodb.com/manual/reference/program/mongodump/ https://docs.mongodb.com/manual/reference/program/mongorestore/

To make remote mongo reachable you can create ssh tunnel to it:

creates a tunnel to the remote mongodb server and tunnels it through port 27117 to the local client

ssh -fN -L 27117:localhost:27017 <remote_host> 

In this case the command to run on the local machine you want to restore to could be:

mongodump  --port 27117 --db <from_db> --archive | mongorestore --archive

In addition to the answer of Justin Jenkins keep in mind that you also can use a ssh tunnel if you don't have mongodb exposed to the network (localhost only)

I use screen to switch between "tasks". for my convenience the ssh tunnel and mongo are executed in separate screen tabs.

step 1: create a tunnel

ssh username@yourdomainOrIP -L 27018:localhost:27017
...Enter your password

step 2 :

mongo
use admin
db.copyDatabase(<fromdb>,<todb>,"localhost:27018",<username>,<password)

If you are using --auth, you'll need to include your username/password in there...

Also you must be on the "destination" server when you run the command.

db.copyDatabase(<from_db>, <to_db>, <from_hostname>, <username>, <password>);

If all that doesn't work, you might want to try something like creating a slave of the database you want to copy ...