Quickstart Windows

Download

The easiest (and recommended) way to install MongoDB is to use the pre-built binaries.

32-bit binaries

Download and extract the 32-bit .zip. The "Production" build is recommended.

64-bit binaries

Download and extract the 64-bit .zip.

Note: 64-bit is recommended, although you must have a 64-bit version of Windows to run that version.

Unzip

Unzip the downloaded binary package to the location of your choice. You may want to rename mongo-xxxxxxx to just "mongo" for convenience.

Create a data directory

By default MongoDB will store data in C:\data\db, but it won't automatically create that folder, so we do so here:

C:\> mkdir \data
C:\> mkdir \data\db

Or you can do this from the Windows Explorer, of course.

Run and connect to the server

The important binaries for a first run are:

• mongod.exe - the database server
• mongo.exe - the administrative shell

To run the database, click mongod.exe in Explorer, or run it from a CMD window.

C:\> cd \my_mongo_dir\bin
C:\my_mongo_dir\bin > mongod

Note: It is also possible to run the server as a Windows Service. But we can do that later.

Now, start the administrative shell, either by double-clicking mongo.exe in Explorer, or from the CMD prompt. By default mongo.exe connects to a mongod server running on localhost and uses the database named test. Run mongo --help to see other options.

C:\> cd \my_mongo_dir\bin
C:\my_mongo_dir\bin> mongo
> // the mongo shell is a javascript shell connected to the db
> 3+3
6
> db
test
> // the first write will create the db:
> db.foo.insert( { a : 1 } )
> db.foo.find()
{ _id : ..., a : 1 }

Congratulations, you've just saved and retrieved your first document with MongoDB!

Learn more

• Tutorial
• Windows quick links
• [Mongo Shell]

Mongo Shell Info