Bulk Operations

On this page

Overview

Performing Bulk Operations
Insert Operation
Replace Operation
Update Operation
Delete Operation
Order of Execution
Ordered Execution
Unordered Execution
Summary

Overview

In this guide, you can learn how to use bulk operations in the MongoDB Java Driver.

To perform a create, replace, update, or delete operation, use its corresponding method. For example, to insert one document, update multiple documents, and delete one document in your collection, use the insertOne(), updateMany() and deleteOne() methods.

The MongoClient performs these operations by making a call for each operation to the database. You can reduce the number of calls to the database to one by using bulk operations.

Performing Bulk Operations

Bulk operations consist of a large number of write operations. To perform a bulk operation, pass a List of WriteModel documents to the bulkWrite() method. A WriteModel is a model that represents any of the write operations.

The following sections show how to create and use each WriteModel document. The examples in each section use the following documents in the people collection:

{ "_id": 1, "name": "Karen Sandoval", "age": 31 }
{ "_id": 2, "name": "William Chin", "age": 54 }
{ "_id": 8, "name": "Shayla Ray", "age": 20 }

For more information about the methods and classes mentioned in this section, see the following API Documentation:

Insert Operation

To perform an insert operation, create an InsertOneModel specifying the document you want to insert. To insert multiple documents, you must create an InsertOneModel for each document you want to insert.

Example

The following example creates an InsertOneModel for two documents describing people:

InsertOneModel<Document> juneDoc = new InsertOneModel<>(new Document("name", "June Carrie")
                                                            .append("age", 17));
                                                  
InsertOneModel<Document> kevinDoc = new InsertOneModel<>(new Document("name", "Kevin Moss")
                                                            .append("age", 22));

Important

When performing a bulkWrite(), the InsertOneModel cannot insert a document with an _id that already exists in the collection. Instead, the method throws a MongoBulkWriteException.

The following example tries to insert two documents where the _id is 1 and 3:

try {
    List<WriteModel<Document>> bulkOperations = new ArrayList<>();
    // Creates instructions to insert documents
    InsertOneModel<Document> doc1 = new InsertOneModel<>(new Document("_id", 1));
    InsertOneModel<Document> doc3 = new InsertOneModel<>(new Document("_id", 3));
    
    bulkOperations.add(doc1);
    bulkOperations.add(doc3);
    
    // Runs a bulk write operation for the specified insert WriteModels
    collection.bulkWrite(bulkOperations); 
// Prints a message if any exceptions occur during the bulk write operation
} catch (MongoBulkWriteException e){
    System.out.println("A MongoBulkWriteException occurred with the following message: " + e.getMessage());
}

The following shows the output of the preceding code:

A MongoBulkWriteException occurred with the following message:
Bulk write operation error on server sample-shard-00-02.pw0q4.mongodb.net:27017.
Write errors: [BulkWriteError{index=0, code=11000, message='E11000 duplicate key
error collection: crudOps.bulkWrite index: _id_ dup key: { _id: 1 }', details={}}].

To see why the document with the _id of 3 didn't insert, see the Order of Execution section.

For more information about the methods and classes mentioned in this section, see the InsertOneModel API Documentation.

Replace Operation

To perform a replace operation, create a ReplaceOneModel specifying a query filter for the document you want to replace with the replacement document.

Important

When performing a bulkWrite(), the ReplaceOneModel cannot make changes to a document that violate unique index constraints on the collection, and the model does not replace a document if there are no matches to your query filter.

Example

The following example creates a ReplaceOneModel to replace a document where the _id is 1 with a document that contains an added location field:

ReplaceOneModel<Document> celineDoc = new ReplaceOneModel<>(
                                    Filters.eq("_id", 1), 
                                    new Document("name", "Celine Stork")
                                        .append("location", "San Diego, CA"));

For more information about the methods and classes mentioned in this section, see the following resources:

ReplaceOneModel API Documentation
Unique indexes Server Manual Explanation

Update Operation

To perform an update operation, create an UpdateOneModel or an UpdateManyModel specifying a query filter for documents you want to update with what the updates are.

The UpdateOneModel updates the first document that matches your query filter and the UpdateManyModel updates all the documents that match your query filter.

Important

When performing a bulkWrite(), the UpdateOneModel and UpdateManyModel cannot make changes to a document that violate unique index constraints on the collection, and the models do not update any documents if there are no matches to your query filter.

Example

The following example creates an UpdateOneModel to update the age field in a document where the _id is 2:

UpdateOneModel<Document> updateDoc = new UpdateOneModel<>(
                                    Filters.eq("_id", 2), 
                                    Updates.set("age", 31));

For more information about the methods and classes mentioned in this section, see the following resources:

UpdateOneModel API Documentation
UpdateManyModel API Documentation
unique indexes Server Manual Explanation

Delete Operation

To perform a delete operation, create a DeleteOneModel or a DeleteManyModel specifying a query filter for documents you want to delete.

The DeleteOneModel deletes the first document that matches your query filter and the DeleteManyModel deletes all the documents that match your query filter.

Important

When performing a bulkWrite(), the DeleteOneModel and DeleteManyModel do not delete any documents if there are no matches to your query filter.

Example

The following example creates a DeleteOneModel to delete a document where the _id is 1:

DeleteOneModel<Document> deleteDoc = new DeleteOneModel<>(Filters.eq("_id", 1));

For more information about the methods and classes mentioned in this section, see the following API Documentation:

Order of Execution

The bulkWrite() method accepts an optional BulkWriteOptions as a second parameter to specify whether the execution of the bulk operations is ordered or unordered.

Ordered Execution

By default, the bulkWrite() method executes bulk operations in order. This means that the bulk operations execute in the order you added them to the list until an error occurs, if any.

Example

The following example performs these bulk operations:

An operation that inserts a document with a name value of "Zaynab Omar" and an age value of 37
An operation that replaces the document where the _id is 1 with a new document that contains the location field
An operation that updates the document with a name value of "Zaynab Omar" and changes the name to "Zaynab Hassan"
An operation that deletes all documents where the age value is greater than 50

List<WriteModel<Document>> bulkOperations = new ArrayList<>();
// Creates instructions to insert a document
InsertOneModel<Document> insertDoc = new InsertOneModel<>(new Document("_id", 6)
                                                        .append("name", "Zaynab Omar")
                                                        .append("age", 37));
// Creates instructions to replace the first document matched by the query                                       
ReplaceOneModel<Document> replaceDoc = new ReplaceOneModel<>(Filters.eq("_id", 1), 
                                        new Document("name", "Sandy Kane")
                                            .append("location", "Helena, MT")); 
// Creates instructions to update the first document matched by the query                                                                 
UpdateOneModel<Document> updateDoc = new UpdateOneModel<>(Filters.eq("name", "Zaynab Omar"), 
                                        Updates.set("name", "Zaynab Hassan"));
// Creates instructions to delete all documents matched by the query                                
DeleteManyModel<Document> deleteDoc = new DeleteManyModel<>(Filters.gt("age", 50));
bulkOperations.add(insertDoc);
bulkOperations.add(replaceDoc);
bulkOperations.add(updateDoc);
bulkOperations.add(deleteDoc);
// Runs a bulk write operation for the specified the insert, replace, update, and delete WriteModels in order
collection.bulkWrite(bulkOperations);

After running this example, your collection contains the following document:

{ "_id": 1, "name": "Sandy Kane", "location": "Helena, MT" }
{ "_id": 8, "name": "Shayla Ray", "age": 20 }
{ "_id": 6, "name": "Zaynab Hassan", "age": 37 }

Unordered Execution

You can also execute bulk operations in any order by specifying "false" to the order() method on BulkWriteOptions. This means that all the write operations execute regardless of errors and if any errors occur the bulk operation reports them at the end.

Adding to the preceding example, including the following specifies the bulk operations to execute in any order:

BulkWriteOptions options = new BulkWriteOptions().ordered(false);
// Runs a bulk write operation for the specified insert, replace, update, and delete WriteModels in any order
collection.bulkWrite(bulkOperations, options);

Note

Unordered bulk operations do not guarantee order of execution. The order can differ from the way you list them to optimize the runtime.

In the preceding example, if the bulkWrite() method decided to perform the insert operation after the update operation, nothing changes with the update operation because the document does not exist at that point in time. Your collection then contains the following documents:

{ "_id": 1, "name": "Sandy Kane", "location": "Helena, MT" }
{ "_id": 8, "name": "Shayla Ray", "age": 20 }
{ "_id": 6, "name": "Zaynab Omar", "age": 37 }

For more information about the methods and classes mentioned in this section, see the following API Documentation:

Summary

To perform a bulk operation, you create and pass a list of WriteModel documents to the bulkWrite() method.

There are 6 different WriteModel documents: InsertOneModel, ReplaceOneModel, UpdateOneModel, UpdateManyModel, DeleteOneModel and DeleteManyModel.

There are two ways to execute the bulkWrite() method:

Ordered, which performs the bulk operations in order until an error occurs, if any
Unordered, which performs all the bulk operations in any order and reports errors at the end, if any

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Insert or Update in a Single Operation

Specify a Query