Neo4j is a graph database. Instead of rows in static tables, you model data as a network of nodes and the relationships between them, and query it with the Cypher query language. It supports ACID transactions, and graph-shaped data is what lets it act as agent memory and as the store behind GraphRAG.
It is available as Neo4j Aura, a fully managed service with a free tier, or as a standalone server you run yourself. Neo4j Desktop manages local databases for development, and graph tools for querying, visualizing, and analyzing data work against both Aura instances and self-managed databases.
The database can be extended: you can build extensions, and libraries or drivers on top of it. A Community Edition is published as open source, and an Enterprise Edition adds closed-source components.
Features
- Property graph model: data stored as nodes and relationships rather than tables
- Cypher: a declarative query language for matching and traversing graph patterns
- ACID transactions: transactional guarantees for graph reads and writes
- Managed service: Neo4j Aura, a fully managed deployment with a free tier
- Self-managed server: a standalone server
- Neo4j Desktop: a local application for creating and managing development databases
- Graph tools: querying, visualization, and analysis tools that work with both managed and self-managed databases
- Extensibility: custom extensions, and libraries or drivers built on top of the database
