Create a database in Azure Cosmos DB for NoSQL using Python

APPLIES TO: NoSQL

Databases in Azure Cosmos DB are units of management for one or more containers. Before you can create or manage containers, you must first create a database.

Name a database

In Azure Cosmos DB, a database is analogous to a namespace. When you create a database, the database name forms a segment of the URI used to access the database resource and any child resources.

Here are some quick rules when naming a database:

• Keep database names between 3 and 63 characters long
• Database names can only contain lowercase letters, numbers, or the dash (-) character.
• Database names must start with a lowercase letter or number.

Once created, the URI for a database is in this format:

https://<cosmos-account-name>.documents.azure.com/dbs/<database-name>

Create a database

To create a database, call one of the following methods:

• CreateDatabaseAsync
• CreateDatabaseIfNotExistsAsync
• Create a database asynchronously

Create a database

The following example creates a database with the CosmosClient.create_database method. This method throws an exception if a database with the same name exists.

try:
    database = client.create_database(id=DATABASE_ID)
    print(f"Database created: {database.id}")

except CosmosResourceExistsError:
    print("Database already exists.")

Create a database if it doesn't already exist

The following example creates a database with the CosmosClient.create_database_if_not_exists method. If the database exists, this method returns the database settings. Compared to the previous create method, this method doesn't throw an exception if the database already exists. This method is useful for avoiding errors if you run the same code multiple times.

try:
    database = client.create_database_if_not_exists(id=DATABASE_ID)
    print(f"Database created or returned: {database.id}")

except CosmosHttpResponseError:
    print("Request to the Azure Cosmos database service failed.")

Create a database asynchronously

You can also create a database asynchronously using similar object and methods in the azure.cosmos.aio namespace. For example, use the CosmosClient.create_database method or the 'CosmoClient.create_database_if_not_exists method.

Working asynchronously is useful when you want to perform multiple operations in parallel. For more information, see Using the asynchronous client.

Parsing the response

In the examples above, the response from the requests is a DatabaseProxy, which is an interface to interact with a specific database. From the proxy, you can access methods to perform operations on the database.

The following example shows the create_database_if_not_exists method returning a database object.

database = client.create_database_if_not_exists(id=DATABASE_ID)
for container in database.list_containers():
    print(f'Container name: {container["id"]}')

Next steps

Now that you've created a database, use the next guide to create containers.

Create a container