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Remove Indexes

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To remove an index from a collection use the dropIndex() method and the following procedure. If you simply need to rebuild indexes you can use the process described in the Rebuild Indexes document.

See also

Indexing Tutorials and Index Concepts for more information about indexes and indexing operations in MongoDB.

Operations

To remove an index, use the db.collection.dropIndex() method, as in the following example:

db.accounts.dropIndex( { "tax-id": 1 } )

This will remove the index on the "tax-id" field in the accounts collection. The shell provides the following document after completing the operation:

{ "nIndexesWas" : 3, "ok" : 1 }

Where the value of nIndexesWas reflects the number of indexes before removing this index. You can also use the db.collection.dropIndexes() to remove all indexes, except for the _id index from a collection.

These shell helpers provide wrappers around the dropIndexes database command. Your client library may have a different or additional interface for these operations.