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Manage Collections in Compass

A collection is a grouping of MongoDB documents. Documents within a collection can have different fields. A collection is the equivalent of a table in a relational database system. A collection exists within a single database.

Collections Screen

The Collections screen lists the existing collections and views in the selected database. Each list item includes the name and other general information for the collection or view.

To access the Collections screen for a database, from the Databases screen either:

  • Click a Database Name in the main Databases view, or
  • Click a database in the left navigation.
Select database

Collection Information

The Collections screen displays the following information for each collection in the selected database:

  • Collection name

  • Number of documents in the collection

    Note

    Compass bases the document count that appears on the Collections screen on cached metadata using collStats. This count might differ from the actual document count in the collection. For example, an unexpected shutdown can throw off the count. Use the db.collection.countDocuments() method for the most accurate document count.

  • Average size of documents in the collection
  • Total size of all documents in the collection
  • Number of indexes on the collection
  • Total size of all indexes on the collection
  • Collation properties for the collection. Hover over a Collation banner to view the properties for that collection.

Note

If you're granted a custom role or privilege to a collection but lack privileges to list server namespaces, Compass lists the collection in the Collections screen with an empty folder icon , and the collection name turns grey. Compass displays the collection this way even if it doesn't exist.

To avoid seeing these collections, you can disable the Infer Additional Namespaces from Privileges setting in the Compass settings panel.

Create a Collection

You can create new collections in an existing database.

1

Click the Create Collection button.

From the Collections screen, click the Create Collection button. Alternatively, you can right-click anywhere on the left-hand menu and select Create collection from the dropdown.

2

Enter the collection information.

In the Create Collection dialog, enter the name of the collection to create.

Compass also provides you with Additional preferences. You can select from the following:

3

Click Create Collection to create the collection.

Drop a Collection

1

Click the trash can icon to delete a collection.

From the Collections screen, click on the trash can for the collection to delete. A confirmation dialog appears.

You can also right-click the collection name and select Drop collection from the drop-down menu.

2

Confirm the collection to delete.

In the dialog, enter the name of the collection to delete.

3

Click Drop Collection to drop the collection.

Collection Details

The Collection Detail screen shows detailed information for a collection, including the documents the collection contains. To see collection details, either:

  • Click a Collection Name in the main Collections screen, or
  • Click a collection in the left navigation.
  • Open the collection in a new tab.

After you select a collection, Compass shows you that collection's Documents tab. Compass provides the following collection information and functionality in the detailed view:

Tabbed View

You can open multiple Collection Detail screens in separate tabs. To open a new tab to view collection details:

1

Click the caret icon next to the database that contains the collection you want to view.

2

Hover over the desired collection.

3

Click the appearing ellipses (...) button or right-click the collection.

4

Click Open in New Tab.

Limitations

  • Creating and dropping collections is not permitted in MongoDB Compass Readonly Edition.