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Definition

profile

Changed in version 5.0.

For a mongod instance, the command enables, disables, or configures the database profiler. The profiler captures and records data on the performance of write operations, cursors, and database commands on a running mongod instance. If the profiler is disabled, the command configures how slow operations are logged to the diagnostic log.

On mongod, if the database profiler level is 2, full logging is enabled on the profiler and the diagnostic log.

At database profiler level 1, the following settings modify both the profiler and the diagnostic log:

If the database profiler level is 0, the database profiler is disabled. At level 0 the following settings only modify the diagnostic log:

Starting in MongoDB 4.0, for a mongos instance, the command only configures how operations get written to the diagnostic log. You cannot enable the database profiler on a mongos instance because mongos does not have any collections that the profiler can write to.

Starting in MongoDB 5.0 (also available starting in 4.4.2, and 4.2.12), changes made to the database profiler level, slowms, sampleRate, or filter using the profile command or db.setProfilingLevel() wrapper method are recorded in the log file.

On mongos, you can set profile level to:

  • 0 to set the slowms, sampleRate, and filter for the diagnostic log;

  • -1 to read the current settings.

The profiler is off by default.

Warning

Profiling can degrade performance and expose unencrypted query data in the system log. Carefully consider any performance and security implications before configuring and enabling the profiler on a production deployment.

See Profiler Overhead for more information on potential performance degradation.

Syntax

The command has the following syntax:

db.runCommand(
  {
    profile: <level>,
    slowms: <threshold>,
    sampleRate: <rate>,
    filter: <filter expression>
  }
)

Command Fields

The command takes the following fields:

FieldTypeDescription
profileintConfigures the profiler level. The following profiler levels are available:
LevelDescription
0The profiler is off and does not collect any data. This is the default profiler level.
1The profiler collects data for operations that take longer than the value of slowms or that match a filter.
When a filter is set:
  • The slowms and sampleRate options are not used for profiling.
  • The profiler only captures operations that match the filter.
2The profiler collects data for all operations.

Since profiling is not available on mongos, the profile command cannot be used to set the profiling level to a value other than 0 on a mongos instance.

slowmsintOptional. Default: 100
The slow operation time threshold, in milliseconds. Operations that run for longer than this threshold are considered slow.
When logLevel is set to 0, MongoDB records slow operations to the diagnostic log at a rate determined by slowOpSampleRate.
At higher logLevel settings, all operations appear in the diagnostic log regardless of their latency with the following exception: the logging of slow oplog entry messages by the secondaries. The secondaries log only the slow oplog entries; increasing the logLevel does not log all oplog entries.

Note

This argument affects the same setting as the configuration option operationProfiling.slowOpThresholdMs.
sampleRatedoubleOptional. Default: 1.0
The fraction of slow operations that should be profiled or logged.
sampleRate accepts values between 0 and 1, inclusive.

Note

This argument affects the same setting as the configuration option operationProfiling.slowOpSampleRate and does not affect the slow oplog entry log messages on secondaries (available starting in MongoDB 4.2).
filterobjectOptional. A query that determines which operations are profiled or logged.
The filter query takes the following form: 
{ <field1>: <expression1>, ... }

The query can be any legal find() operation where the query <field> matches a field in the profiler output.

Note

This argument affects the same setting as the configuration option operationProfiling.filter.

When filter is set, the slowms and sampleRate options are not used for profiling and slow-query log lines.

New in version 4.4.2.

The db.getProfilingStatus() and db.setProfilingLevel() shell methods provide wrappers around the profile command.

Behavior

The profile command obtains a write lock on the affected database while enabling or disabling the profiler. This is typically a short operation. The lock blocks other operations until the profile command has completed.

Starting in MongoDB 4.4.2, when connected to a sharded cluster through mongos, you can run the profile command against any database. In previous versions of MongoDB, when connected through mongos, you can only run the profile command against the admin database.

Tip

See also:

Database Profiling

Example

Enable Filtering

To enable profiling and filter the logged data:

db.runCommand(
   {
     profile: 1,
     filter:
        {
           $or:
           [
              { millis: { $gte: 100 } },
              { user: "testuser@admin" }
           ]
        }
   }
)

The filter only selects operations that are:

  • at least 100 milliseconds long, or

  • submitted by the testuser.

Unset a Filter

To clear a profile filter, run profile with the filter: "unset" option.

db.runCommand(
   {
      profile: 1,
      filter: "unset"
   }
)

The operation returns a document with the previous values for the settings.

To view the current profiling level, see db.getProfilingStatus().