Connect Liquibase with Cassandra

Last updated: September 19, 2025

Apache Cassandra is an open source, distributed, NoSQL database. It presents a partitioned wide column storage model with consistent semantics.

For more information, see the Apache Cassandra page.

Supported database versions

The extension's JDBC wrapper uses the Java Driver for Apache Cassandra® which is designed for:

  • Apache Cassandra® 2.1+

  • DataStax Enterprise (5.0+)

Note: It will throw "unsupported feature" exceptions if used against an older version of Cassandra cluster.

For more information, please check the compatibility matrix and read the driver documentation.

Before you begin

  • Install Liquibase.

  • Ensure you have Java installed. Liquibase requires Java to run. If you used the Liquibase Installer, Java is included automatically. Otherwise, you must install Java manually.

  • Ensure your Cassandra database is installed and configured.

Procedure

1

(Maven users only) Install a local copy of Maven

If you're running Liquibase using the Maven plugin using mvn liquibase: update, installing the extension with Maven ensures the right files are available and everything works together automatically. You can manage these extensions by adding them as dependencies in your project’s pom.xml file. Configuring Maven this way ensures that the necessary JAR files are retrieved from Maven Central during the build phase.

2

Configure your connection

Specify the database JDBC URL in the liquibase.properties file (defaults file), along with other properties you want to set a default value for. Liquibase does not parse the URL. Always specify the compliancemode parameter with the value Liquibase to avoid any unexpected behaviour when running the changelog.

url: jdbc:cassandra://<host1>[:<port1>][...--<hostN>[:<portN>]]/<keyspace>?compliancemode=Liquibase[&localdatacenter=<datacenter_name>]

For more information, see the specifying Cassandra JDBC connection strings documentation.

3

Test your connection

1. Create a text file called changelog (.xml, .sql, .json, or .yaml) in your project directory and add a changeset.

If you already created a changelog using the init project command, you can use that instead of creating a new file. When adding onto an existing changelog, be sure only to add the changeset and not duplicate the changelog header.

SQL example
-- liquibase formatted sql
-- changeset my_name:1
CREATE TABLE test_table (
  test_id INT,
  test_column INT,
  PRIMARY KEY (test_id)
)

2. Navigate to your project folder in the CLI and run the Liquibase status command to see whether the connection is successful:

liquibase status --username=test --password=test --changelog-file=<changelog.xml>

Note: You can specify arguments in the CLI or keep them in the Liquibase properties file.

If your connection is successful, you'll see a message like this:

4 changesets have not been applied to <your_connection_url> Liquibase command 'status' was executed successfully.

3. Inspect the deployment SQL with the update-sql command

liquibase update-sql --changelog-file=<changelog.xml>

If the SQL that Liquibase generates isn't what you expect, you should review your changelog file and make any necessary adjustments.

4. Then execute these changes to your database with the update command:

liquibase update --changelog-file=<changelog.xml>

If your update is successful, Liquibase runs each changeset and displays a summary message ending with:

Liquibase: Update has been successful. Liquibase command 'update' was executed successfully.

5. From a database UI tool, ensure that your database contains the test_table object you added along with the DATABASECHANGELOG table and DATABASECHANGELOGLOCK table.

Connect Liquibase with Cassandra - Liquibase