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Install using .tgz Tarball on macOS

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Overview

The following tutorial downloads the .tgz file directly to install MongoDB Community Edition on macOS. To install using brew, see Install MongoDB Community Edition on macOS instead.

Platform Support

Changed in version 3.2.19: MongoDB now requires macOS 10.8 or later.

MongoDB requires macOS version 10.8 (Mountain Lion) or later running on an x86_64 processor.

Install MongoDB Community Edition

1

Download the binary files for the desired release of MongoDB.

Download the binaries from https://www.mongodb.org/downloads.

For example, to download the latest release through the shell, issue the following:

copy 
curl -O https://fastdl.mongodb.org/osx/mongodb-osx-x86_64-3.2.22.tgz
2

Extract the files from the downloaded archive.

For example, from a system shell, you can extract through the tar command:

copy 
tar -zxvf mongodb-osx-x86_64-3.2.22.tgz
3

Copy the extracted archive to the target directory.

Copy the extracted folder to the location from which MongoDB will run.

copy 
mkdir -p mongodb
cp -R -n mongodb-osx-x86_64-3.2.22/ mongodb
4

Ensure the location of the binaries is in the PATH variable.

The MongoDB binaries are in the bin/ directory of the archive. To ensure that the binaries are in your PATH, you can modify your PATH.

For example, you can add the following line to your shell’s rc file (e.g. ~/.bashrc):

copy 
export PATH=<mongodb-install-directory>/bin:$PATH

Replace <mongodb-install-directory> with the path to the extracted MongoDB archive.

Run MongoDB

1

Create the data directory.

Before you start MongoDB for the first time, create the directory to which the mongod process will write data. By default, the mongod process uses the /data/db directory. If you create a directory other than this one, you must specify that directory in the dbpath option when starting the mongod process later in this procedure.

The following example command creates the default /data/db directory:

copy 
mkdir -p /data/db
2

Set permissions for the data directory.

Before running mongod for the first time, ensure that the user account running mongod has read and write permissions for the directory.

3

Run MongoDB.

To run MongoDB, run the mongod process at the system prompt. If necessary, specify the path of the mongod or the data directory. See the following examples.

Run without specifying paths

If your system PATH variable includes the location of the mongod binary and if you use the default data directory (i.e., /data/db), simply enter mongod at the system prompt:

copy 
mongod

Specify the path of the mongod

If your PATH does not include the location of the mongod binary, enter the full path to the mongod binary at the system prompt:

copy 
<path to binary>/mongod

Specify the path of the data directory

If you do not use the default data directory (i.e., /data/db), specify the path to the data directory using the --dbpath option:

copy 
mongod --dbpath <path to data directory>
4

Begin using MongoDB.

To help you start using MongoDB, MongoDB provides Getting Started Guides in various driver editions. See Getting Started for the available editions.

Before deploying MongoDB in a production environment, consider the Production Notes document.

Later, to stop MongoDB, press Control+C in the terminal where the mongod instance is running.

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