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Sharding

Deploy a Sharded Cluster

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  • Overview
  • Considerations
  • Procedure

Overview

This tutorial involves creating a new sharded cluster that consists of a mongos, the config server replica set, and two shard replica sets.

Considerations

Connectivity

Each member of a sharded cluster must be able to connect to all other members in the cluster. This includes all shards and config servers. Ensure that network and security systems, including all interface and firewalls, allow these connections.

Hostnames and Configuration

Important

To avoid configuration updates due to IP address changes, use DNS hostnames instead of IP addresses. It is particularly important to use a DNS hostname instead of an IP address when configuring replica set members or sharded cluster members.

Use hostnames instead of IP addresses to configure clusters across a split network horizon. Starting in MongoDB 5.0, nodes that are only configured with an IP address will fail startup validation and will not start.

Localhost Deployments

If you use either localhost or its IP address as the hostname portion of any host identifier, you must use that identifier as the host setting for any other MongoDB component in the cluster.

For example, the sh.addShard() method takes a host parameter for the hostname of the target shard. If you set host to localhost, you must then use localhost as the host for all other shards in the cluster.

Security

This tutorial does not include the required steps for configuring Internal/Membership Authentication or Role-Based Access Control.

In production environments, sharded clusters should employ at minimum x.509 security for internal authentication and client access.

Procedure

Create the Config Server Replica Set

The following steps deploys a config server replica set.

For a production deployment, deploy a config server replica set with at least three members. For testing purposes, you can create a single-member replica set.

Note

The config server replica set must not use the same name as any of the shard replica sets.

For this tutorial, the config server replica set members are associated with the following hosts:

Config Server Replica Set Member
Hostname
Member 0
cfg1.example.net
Member 1
cfg2.example.net
Member 2
cfg3.example.net
1

Start each member of the config server replica set.

When starting each mongod, specify the mongod settings either via a configuration file or the command line.

If using a configuration file, set:

sharding:
  clusterRole: configsvr
replication:
  replSetName: <replica set name>
net:
  bindIp: localhost,<hostname(s)|ip address(es)>

  • sharding.clusterRole to configsvr,

  • replication.replSetName to the desired name of the config server replica set,

  • net.bindIp option to the hostname/ip address or comma-delimited list of hostnames or ip addresses that remote clients (including the other members of the config server replica set as well as other members of the sharded cluster) can use to connect to the instance.

    Warning

    Before you bind your instance to a publicly-accessible IP address, you must secure your cluster from unauthorized access. For a complete list of security recommendations, see Security Checklist. At minimum, consider enabling authentication and hardening network infrastructure.

  • Additional settings as appropriate to your deployment, such as storage.dbPath and net.port. For more information on the configuration file, see configuration options.

Start the mongod with the --config option set to the configuration file path.

mongod --config <path-to-config-file>

If using the command line options, start the mongod with the --configsvr, --replSet, --bind_ip, and other options as appropriate to your deployment. For example:

Warning

Before you bind your instance to a publicly-accessible IP address, you must secure your cluster from unauthorized access. For a complete list of security recommendations, see Security Checklist. At minimum, consider enabling authentication and hardening network infrastructure.

mongod --configsvr --replSet <replica set name> --dbpath <path> --bind_ip localhost,<hostname(s)|ip address(es)>

For more information on startup parameters, see the mongod reference page.

2

Connect to one of the config servers.

Connect mongosh to one of the config server members.

mongosh --host <hostname> --port <port>
3

Initiate the replica set.

From mongosh, run the rs.initiate() method.

rs.initiate() can take an optional replica set configuration document. In the replica set configuration document, include:

  • The _id set to the replica set name specified in either the replication.replSetName or the --replSet option.

  • The configsvr field set to true for the config server replica set.

  • The members array with a document per each member of the replica set.

Important

Run rs.initiate() on just one and only one mongod instance for the replica set.

rs.initiate(
  {
    _id: "myReplSet",
    configsvr: true,
    members: [
      { _id : 0, host : "cfg1.example.net:27019" },
      { _id : 1, host : "cfg2.example.net:27019" },
      { _id : 2, host : "cfg3.example.net:27019" }
    ]
  }
)

See Replica Set Configuration for more information on replica set configuration documents.

Once the config server replica set (CSRS) is initiated and up, proceed to creating the shard replica sets.

Create the Shard Replica Sets

For a production deployment, use a replica set with at least three members. For testing purposes, you can create a single-member replica set.

Note

Shard replica sets must not use the same name as the config server replica set.

For each shard, use the following steps to create the shard replica set:

1

Start each member of the shard replica set.

When starting each mongod, specify the mongod settings either via a configuration file or the command line.

If using a configuration file, set:

sharding:
    clusterRole: shardsvr
replication:
    replSetName: <replSetName>
net:
    bindIp: localhost,<ip address>

Start the mongod with the --config option set to the configuration file path.

mongod --config <path-to-config-file>

If using the command line option, start the mongod with the --replSet, and --shardsvr, --bind_ip options, and other options as appropriate to your deployment. For example:

mongod --shardsvr --replSet <replSetname>  --dbpath <path> --bind_ip localhost,<hostname(s)|ip address(es)>

For more information on startup parameters, see the mongod reference page.

2

Connect to one member of the shard replica set.

Connect mongosh to one of the replica set members.

mongosh --host <hostname> --port <port>
3

Initiate the replica set.

From mongosh, run the rs.initiate() method.

rs.initiate() can take an optional replica set configuration document. In the replica set configuration document, include:

  • The _id field set to the replica set name specified in either the replication.replSetName or the --replSet option.

  • The members array with a document per each member of the replica set.

The following example initiates a three member replica set.

Important

Run rs.initiate() on just one and only one mongod instance for the replica set.

rs.initiate(
  {
    _id : "myReplSet",
    members: [
      { _id : 0, host : "s1-mongo1.example.net:27018" },
      { _id : 1, host : "s1-mongo2.example.net:27018" },
      { _id : 2, host : "s1-mongo3.example.net:27018" }
    ]
  }
)

Start a mongos for the Sharded Cluster

Start a mongos using either a configuration file or a command line parameter to specify the config servers.

If using a configuration file, set the sharding.configDB to the config server replica set name and at least one member of the replica set in <replSetName>/<host:port> format.

Warning

Before you bind your instance to a publicly-accessible IP address, you must secure your cluster from unauthorized access. For a complete list of security recommendations, see Security Checklist. At minimum, consider enabling authentication and hardening network infrastructure.

sharding:
  configDB: <configReplSetName>/cfg1.example.net:27019,cfg2.example.net:27019
net:
  bindIp: localhost,<hostname(s)|ip address(es)>

Start the mongos specifying the --config option and the path to the configuration file.

mongos --config <path-to-config>

For more information on the configuration file, see configuration options.

If using command line parameters start the mongos and specify the --configdb, --bind_ip, and other options as appropriate to your deployment. For example:

Warning

Before you bind your instance to a publicly-accessible IP address, you must secure your cluster from unauthorized access. For a complete list of security recommendations, see Security Checklist. At minimum, consider enabling authentication and hardening network infrastructure.

mongos --configdb <configReplSetName>/cfg1.example.net:27019,cfg2.example.net:27019,cfg3.example.net:27019 --bind_ip localhost,<hostname(s)|ip address(es)>

Include any other options as appropriate for your deployment.

At this point, your sharded cluster consists of the mongos and the config servers. You can now connect to the sharded cluster using mongosh.

Connect to the Sharded Cluster

Connect mongosh to the mongos. Specify the host and port on which the mongos is running:

mongosh --host <hostname> --port <port>

Once you have connected mongosh to the mongos, continue to the next procedure to add shards to the cluster.

Add Shards to the Cluster

In a mongosh session that is connected to the mongos, use the sh.addShard() method to add each shard to the cluster.

The following operation adds a single shard replica set to the cluster:

sh.addShard( "<replSetName>/s1-mongo1.example.net:27018,s1-mongo2.example.net:27018,s1-mongo3.example.net:27018")

Repeat these steps until the cluster includes all desired shards.

Shard a Collection

To shard a collection, connect mongosh to the mongos and use the sh.shardCollection() method.

Note

Sharding and Indexes

If the collection already contains data, you must create an index that supports the shard key before sharding the collection. If the collection is empty, MongoDB creates the index as part of sh.shardCollection().

MongoDB provides two strategies to shard collections:

  • Hashed sharding uses a hashed index of a single field as the shard key to partition data across your sharded cluster.

    sh.shardCollection("<database>.<collection>", { <shard key field> : "hashed" } )

  • Range-based sharding can use multiple fields as the shard key and divides data into contiguous ranges determined by the shard key values.

    sh.shardCollection("<database>.<collection>", { <shard key field> : 1, ... } )

Shard Key Considerations

Your selection of shard key affects the efficiency of sharding, as well as your ability to take advantage of certain sharding features such as zones. To learn how to choose an effective shard key, see Choose a Shard Key.

Starting in version 4.0, mongosh provides the method convertShardKeyToHashed(). This method uses the same hashing function as the hashed index and can be used to see what the hashed value would be for a key.

Tip

See also:

Back

Ranged Sharding