DUMP(3valkey)

📦
version 9.0.6 · 2 versions
, in fedora 44

💅 DUMP — a Valkey Command Manual moment (3valkey)

okay bestie, welcome to DUMP(3valkey), the page where we talk about yeeting your value into a weird little blob of bytes ✨

🌸 NAME 🌸

dump — literally hands you back a serialized representation of whatever value is chillin' at a key. it's giving "screenshot but for your data" 📸

🎀 SYNOPSIS 🎀

DUMP key

✨ DESCRIPTION ✨

So what it does is: it serializes the value stored at key in a Valkey-specific format and returns it right back to you, bestie. And the cutest part? You can synthesize that returned value back into a Valkey key later using the valkey-restore(7) RESTORE command. it's giving boomerang 🪃

The serialization format is opaque and non-standard — so don't go trying to read it like a bedtime story, okay? that said, it does have a few semantic characteristics worth knowing:

  • It contains a 64-bit checksum that's there to make sure errors get detected. RESTORE makes sure to check that checksum before it synthesizes a key using the serialized value. no cap, it's a whole vibe check on your bytes 💀
  • Values are encoded in the same format used by RDB.
  • An RDB version is encoded inside the serialized value, so different Valkey versions with incompatible RDB formats will straight up refuse to process the serialized value. iconic gatekeeping honestly 👑
The serialized value does NOT contain expire information. So if you wanna capture the time to live of the current value, you should use the valkey-pttl(7) PTTL command. don't forget it, bestie 😭

And if key does not exist? you get a nil bulk reply back. sorry queen 🫶

💌 REPLY 💌

RESP2

One of the following:

RESP3

One of the following:

🦋 COMPLEXITY 🦋

O(1) to access the key, plus additional O(NM) to serialize it — where N is the number of objects composing the value and M is their average size.

For small string values the time complexity is thus O(1)+O(1M) where M is small, so simply O(1). tiny key, tiny effort, main character energy ⭐

👑 ACL CATEGORIES 👑

@keyspace @read @slow

🌈 HISTORY 🌈

  • Available since: 2.6.0 — an elder, lowkey, and we respect her 💜

🍓 EXAMPLES 🍓

> SET mykey 10
OK
> DUMP mykey
"\x00\xc0\n\n\x00n\x9fWE\x0e\xaec\xbb"

look at that absolute soup of escapes. she's beautiful. don't touch her, just RESTORE her 🧚

💖 SEE ALSO 💖

copy(3valkey), del(3valkey), exists(3valkey), expire(3valkey), expireat(3valkey), expiretime(3valkey), keys(3valkey), migrate(3valkey), move(3valkey), object(3valkey), object-encoding(3valkey), object-freq(3valkey), object-help(3valkey), object-idletime(3valkey), object-refcount(3valkey), persist(3valkey), pexpire(3valkey), pexpireat(3valkey), pexpiretime(3valkey), pttl(3valkey), randomkey(3valkey), rename(3valkey), renamenx(3valkey), restore(3valkey), scan(3valkey), sort(3valkey), sort_ro(3valkey), touch(3valkey), ttl(3valkey), type(3valkey), unlink(3valkey), wait(3valkey), waitaof(3valkey)

and that's the whole page, bestie!! this was DUMP(3valkey) from the 9.0.0 era, dated 2025-10-21 — go forth and serialize responsibly 💅✨🎀

📦 where this page comes from