Bigtable client libraries

This page shows how to get started with the Cloud Client Libraries for the Cloud Bigtable API. Read more about the client libraries for Cloud APIs in Client Libraries Explained.

Installing the client library

C++

See the GitHub README for details about this client library's requirements and install dependencies.

C#

For more information, see Setting Up a C# Development Environment.

Install-Package Google.Cloud.Bigtable.V2 -Pre
Install-Package Google.Cloud.Bigtable.Admin.V2 -Pre

Go

For more information, see Setting Up a Go Development Environment.

go get cloud.google.com/go/bigtable

Java

For more information, see Setting Up a Java Development Environment.

If you are using Maven, add the following to your pom.xml file. For more information about BOMs, see The Google Cloud Platform Libraries BOM.

<dependencyManagement>
  <dependencies>
    <dependency>
      <groupId>com.google.cloud</groupId>
      <artifactId>libraries-bom</artifactId>
      <version>25.3.0</version>
      <type>pom</type>
      <scope>import</scope>
    </dependency>
  </dependencies>
</dependencyManagement>

<dependencies>
  <dependency>
    <groupId>com.google.cloud</groupId>
    <artifactId>google-cloud-bigtable</artifactId>
  </dependency>

If you are using Gradle, add the following to your dependencies:

implementation platform('com.google.cloud:libraries-bom:25.3.0')

implementation 'com.google.cloud:google-cloud-bigtable'

If you are using sbt, add the following to your dependencies:

libraryDependencies += "com.google.cloud" % "google-cloud-bigtable" % "2.6.2"

Note: Cloud Java client libraries do not currently support Android.

HBase

The Bigtable HBase client for Java includes the following Maven artifacts that you can use in your project. All of the artifacts are based on HBase 1.x:

• bigtable-hbase-1.x: Use this artifact for standalone applications where you control your dependencies.
• bigtable-hbase-1.x-hadoop: Use this artifact for Hadoop environments.
• bigtable-hbase-1.x-shaded: Use this artifact for environments other than Hadoop that require older versions of the HBase client for Java's dependencies, such as protobuf and Guava.

Note: The Maven Repository includes additional artifacts for Bigtable. Do not use these additional artifacts in your application.

The Bigtable Maven artifacts include the netty-tcnative-boringssl-static library, which requires that you use Linux, macOS, or Windows on an x86 64-bit processor.

If your application runs in the App Engine standard environment, you must use a current version of the Java runtime. The Java 7 runtime is deprecated and does not support the HBase client for Java.

The following examples assume that you are using the bigtable-hbase-1.x artifact.

If you are using Maven, add the following to your pom.xml file. For more information about BOMs, see The Google Cloud Platform Libraries BOM.

<dependency>
  <groupId>com.google.cloud.bigtable</groupId>
  <artifactId>bigtable-hbase-1.x</artifactId>
  <version>2.0.0</version>
</dependency>

If you are using Gradle, add the following to your dependencies:

compile 'com.google.cloud.bigtable:bigtable-hbase-1.x:2.0.0'

If you are using sbt, add the following to your dependencies:

libraryDependencies += "com.google.cloud.bigtable" % "bigtable-hbase-1.x" % "2.0.0"

Note: Cloud Java client libraries do not currently support Android.

Node.js

For more information, see Setting Up a Node.js Development Environment.

npm install --save @google-cloud/bigtable

PHP

For more information, see Using PHP on Google Cloud.

Install and enable the gRPC extension for PHP, then run the following command:

composer require google/cloud-bigtable

Python

For more information, see Setting Up a Python Development Environment.

pip install --upgrade google-cloud-bigtable

Ruby

For more information, see Setting Up a Ruby Development Environment.

gem install google-cloud-bigtable

Setting up authentication

To run the client library, you must first set up authentication. One way to do that is to create a service account and set an environment variable, as shown in the following steps. For other ways to authenticate, see Authenticating as a service account.

Console

Create a service account:

1. In the Cloud console, go to the Create service account page.

   Go to Create service account
2. Select your project.

3. In the Service account name field, enter a name. The Cloud console fills in the Service account ID field based on this name.

   In the Service account description field, enter a description. For example, Service account for quickstart.

4. Click Create and continue.

5. To provide access to your project, grant the following role(s) to your service account: Project > Owner.

   In the Select a role list, select a role.

   For additional roles, click Add another role and add each additional role.

   Note: The Role field affects which resources your service account can access in your project. You can revoke these roles or grant additional roles later. In production environments, do not grant the Owner, Editor, or Viewer roles. Instead, grant a predefined role or custom role that meets your needs.
6. Click Continue.

7. Click Done to finish creating the service account.

   Do not close your browser window. You will use it in the next step.

Create a service account key:

1. In the Cloud console, click the email address for the service account that you created.
2. Click Keys.
3. Click Add key, and then click Create new key.
4. Click Create. A JSON key file is downloaded to your computer.
5. Click Close.

gcloud

Set up authentication:

1. Create the service account. Replace NAME with a name for the service account:

   gcloud iam service-accounts create NAME

2. Grant roles to the service account. Run the following command once for each of the following IAM roles: roles/owner:

   gcloud projects add-iam-policy-binding PROJECT_ID --member="serviceAccount:SERVICE_ACCOUNT_NAME@PROJECT_ID.iam.gserviceaccount.com" --role=ROLE

   Replace the following:

   • SERVICE_ACCOUNT_NAME: the name of the service account
   • PROJECT_ID: the project ID where you created the service account
   • ROLE: the role to grant
   Note: The --role flag affects which resources your service account can access in your project. You can revoke these roles or grant additional roles later. In production environments, do not grant the Owner, Editor, or Viewer roles. Instead, grant a predefined role or custom role that meets your needs.

3. Generate the key file:

   gcloud iam service-accounts keys create FILE_NAME.json --iam-account=SERVICE_ACCOUNT_NAME@PROJECT_ID.iam.gserviceaccount.com

   Replace the following:

   • FILE_NAME: a name for the key file
   • SERVICE_ACCOUNT_NAME: the name of the service account
   • PROJECT_ID: the project ID where you created the service account

Provide authentication credentials to your application code by setting the environment variable GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS. This variable applies only to your current shell session. If you want the variable to apply to future shell sessions, set the variable in your shell startup file, for example in the ~/.bashrc or ~/.profile file.

Linux or macOS

export GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS="KEY_PATH"

Replace KEY_PATH with the path of the JSON file that contains your service account key.

For example:

export GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS="/home/user/Downloads/service-account-file.json"

Windows

For PowerShell:

$env:GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS="KEY_PATH"

Replace KEY_PATH with the path of the JSON file that contains your service account key.

For example:

$env:GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS="C:\Users\username\Downloads\service-account-file.json"

For command prompt:

set GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS=KEY_PATH

Replace KEY_PATH with the path of the JSON file that contains your service account key.

Using the client library

The following example shows how to use the client library. The example connects to a Bigtable instance and reads a row from a table.

If you haven't stored any data in Bigtable yet, you can use the cbt command-line tool to create a table and add some data. See the quickstart using cbt for instructions.

C++

To learn how to install and use the client library for Bigtable, see Bigtable client libraries.

View on GitHub Feedback

#include "google/cloud/bigtable/table.h"

int main(int argc, char* argv[]) try {
  if (argc != 4) {
    std::string const cmd = argv[0];
    auto last_slash = std::string(cmd).find_last_of('/');
    std::cerr << "Usage: " << cmd.substr(last_slash + 1)
              << " <project_id> <instance_id> <table_id>\n";
    return 1;
  }

  std::string const project_id = argv[1];
  std::string const instance_id = argv[2];
  std::string const table_id = argv[3];

  // Create a namespace alias to make the code easier to read.
  namespace cbt = ::google::cloud::bigtable;

  cbt::Table table(cbt::MakeDataClient(project_id, instance_id), table_id);

  std::string row_key = "r1";
  std::string column_family = "cf1";

  std::cout << "Getting a single row by row key:" << std::flush;
  google::cloud::StatusOr<std::pair<bool, cbt::Row>> result =
      table.ReadRow(row_key, cbt::Filter::FamilyRegex(column_family));
  if (!result) throw std::runtime_error(result.status().message());
  if (!result->first) {
    std::cout << "Cannot find row " << row_key << " in the table: " << table_id
              << "\n";
    return 0;
  }

  cbt::Cell const& cell = result->second.cells().front();
  std::cout << cell.family_name() << ":" << cell.column_qualifier() << "    @ "
            << cell.timestamp().count() << "us\n"
            << '"' << cell.value() << '"' << "\n";

  return 0;
} catch (std::exception const& ex) {
  std::cerr << "Standard C++ exception raised: " << ex.what() << "\n";
  return 1;
}

C#

To learn how to install and use the client library for Bigtable, see Bigtable client libraries.

View on GitHub Feedback

using System;
using Google.Cloud.Bigtable.Common.V2;
// Imports the Google Cloud client library
using Google.Cloud.Bigtable.V2;

namespace GoogleCloudSamples.Bigtable
{
    public class QuickStart
    {
        public static int Main(string[] args)
        {
            // Your Google Cloud Platform project ID
            const string projectId = "YOUR-PROJECT-ID";
            // The name of the Cloud Bigtable instance
            const string instanceId = "YOUR-INSTANCE-ID";
            // The name of the Cloud Bigtable table
            const string tableId = "my-table";

            try
            {
                // Creates a Bigtable client
                BigtableClient bigtableClient = BigtableClient.Create();

                // Read a row from my-table using a row key
                Row row = bigtableClient.ReadRow(
                    new TableName(projectId, instanceId, tableId), "r1", RowFilters.CellsPerRowLimit(1));
                // Print the row key and data (column value, labels, timestamp)
                Console.WriteLine($"{"Row key:",-30}{row.Key.ToStringUtf8()}\n" +
                                  $"{"  Column Family:",-30}{row.Families[0].Name}\n" +
                                  $"{"    Column Qualifyer:",-30}{row.Families[0].Columns[0].Qualifier.ToStringUtf8()}\n" +
                                  $"{"      Value:",-30}{row.Families[0].Columns[0].Cells[0].Value.ToStringUtf8()}\n" +
                                  $"{"      Labels:",-30}{row.Families[0].Columns[0].Cells[0].Labels}\n" +
                                  $"{"      Timestamp:",-30}{row.Families[0].Columns[0].Cells[0].TimestampMicros}\n");
            }
            catch (Exception ex)
            {
                // Handle error performing the read operation
                Console.WriteLine($"Error reading row r1: {ex.Message}");
            }
            return 0;
        }
    }
}

Go

To learn how to install and use the client library for Bigtable, see Bigtable client libraries.

View on GitHub Feedback

// Quickstart is a sample program demonstrating use of the Cloud Bigtable client
// library to read a row from an existing table.
package main

import (
	"context"
	"flag"
	"log"

	"cloud.google.com/go/bigtable"
)

func main() {
	projectID := "my-project-id"   // The Google Cloud Platform project ID
	instanceID := "my-instance-id" // The Google Cloud Bigtable instance ID
	tableID := "my-table"          // The Google Cloud Bigtable table

	ctx := context.Background()

	// Set up Bigtable data operations client.
	client, err := bigtable.NewClient(ctx, projectID, instanceID)
	if err != nil {
		log.Fatalf("Could not create data operations client: %v", err)
	}

	tbl := client.Open(tableID)

	// Read data in a row using a row key
	rowKey := "r1"
	columnFamilyName := "cf1"

	log.Printf("Getting a single row by row key:")
	row, err := tbl.ReadRow(ctx, rowKey)
	if err != nil {
		log.Fatalf("Could not read row with key %s: %v", rowKey, err)
	}
	log.Printf("Row key: %s\n", rowKey)
	log.Printf("Data: %s\n", string(row[columnFamilyName][0].Value))

	if err = client.Close(); err != nil {
		log.Fatalf("Could not close data operations client: %v", err)
	}
}

Java

To learn how to install and use the client library for Bigtable, see Bigtable client libraries.

View on GitHub Feedback

import com.google.api.gax.rpc.NotFoundException;
import com.google.cloud.bigtable.data.v2.BigtableDataClient;
import com.google.cloud.bigtable.data.v2.BigtableDataSettings;
import com.google.cloud.bigtable.data.v2.models.Row;
import com.google.cloud.bigtable.data.v2.models.RowCell;

public class Quickstart {

  public static void main(String... args) {
    String projectId = args[0]; // my-gcp-project-id
    String instanceId = args[1]; // my-bigtable-instance-id
    String tableId = args[2]; // my-bigtable-table-id

    quickstart(projectId, instanceId, tableId);
  }

  public static void quickstart(String projectId, String instanceId, String tableId) {
    BigtableDataSettings settings =
        BigtableDataSettings.newBuilder().setProjectId(projectId).setInstanceId(instanceId).build();

    // Initialize client that will be used to send requests. This client only needs to be created
    // once, and can be reused for multiple requests. After completing all of your requests, call
    // the "close" method on the client to safely clean up any remaining background resources.
    try (BigtableDataClient dataClient = BigtableDataClient.create(settings)) {
      System.out.println("\nReading a single row by row key");
      Row row = dataClient.readRow(tableId, "r1");
      System.out.println("Row: " + row.getKey().toStringUtf8());
      for (RowCell cell : row.getCells()) {
        System.out.printf(
            "Family: %s    Qualifier: %s    Value: %s%n",
            cell.getFamily(), cell.getQualifier().toStringUtf8(), cell.getValue().toStringUtf8());
      }
    } catch (NotFoundException e) {
      System.err.println("Failed to read from a non-existent table: " + e.getMessage());
    } catch (Exception e) {
      System.out.println("Error during quickstart: \n" + e.toString());
    }
  }
}

HBase

Read more in the API Reference Documentation for the Bigtable HBase Client for Java.

View on GitHub Feedback

package com.example.cloud.bigtable.quickstart;

import com.google.cloud.bigtable.hbase.BigtableConfiguration;

import java.io.IOException;
import org.apache.hadoop.hbase.TableName;
import org.apache.hadoop.hbase.client.Connection;
import org.apache.hadoop.hbase.client.Get;
import org.apache.hadoop.hbase.client.Result;
import org.apache.hadoop.hbase.client.Table;
import org.apache.hadoop.hbase.util.Bytes;

/**
 * A quickstart application that shows connecting to a Cloud Bigtable instance
 * using the native HBase API to read a row from a table.
 */
public class Quickstart {

  public static void main(String... args) {

    String projectId = args[0];  // my-gcp-project-id
    String instanceId = args[1]; // my-bigtable-instance-id
    String tableId = args[2];    // my-bigtable-table-id

    // Create a connection to the Cloud Bigtable instance.
    // Use try-with-resources to make sure the connection is closed correctly
    try (Connection connection = BigtableConfiguration.connect(projectId, instanceId)) {

      System.out.println("--- Connection established with Bigtable Instance ---");
      // Create a connection to the table that already exists
      // Use try-with-resources to make sure the connection to the table is closed correctly
      try (Table table = connection.getTable(TableName.valueOf(tableId))) {

        // Read a row
        String rowKey = "r1";
        System.out.printf("--- Reading for row-key: %s for provided table: %s ---\n",
            rowKey, tableId);

        // Retrieve the result
        Result result = table.get(new Get(Bytes.toBytes(rowKey)));

        // Convert row data to string
        String rowValue = Bytes.toString(result.value());

        System.out.printf("Scanned value for Row r1: %s \n", rowValue);

        System.out.println(" --- Finished reading row --- ");

      }  catch (IOException e) {
        // handle exception while connecting to a table
        throw e;
      }
    } catch (IOException e) {
      System.err.println("Exception while running quickstart: " + e.getMessage());
      e.printStackTrace();
    }
  }
}

Node.js

To learn how to install and use the client library for Bigtable, see Bigtable client libraries.

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// Imports the Google Cloud client library
const {Bigtable} = require('@google-cloud/bigtable');

const bigtable = new Bigtable();

async function quickstart() {
  // Connect to an existing instance:my-bigtable-instance
  const instance = bigtable.instance(INSTANCE_ID);

  // Connect to an existing table:my-table
  const table = instance.table(TABLE_ID);

  // Read a row from my-table using a row key
  const [singleRow] = await table.row('r1').get();

  // Print the row key and data (column value, labels, timestamp)
  const rowData = JSON.stringify(singleRow.data, null, 4);
  console.log(`Row key: ${singleRow.id}\nData: ${rowData}`);
}
quickstart();

PHP

To learn how to install and use the client library for Bigtable, see Bigtable client libraries.

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use Google\Cloud\Bigtable\BigtableClient;

/** Uncomment and populate these variables in your code */
// $projectId = 'The Google project ID';
// $instanceId = 'The Bigtable instance ID';
// $tableId = 'The Bigtable table ID';

// Connect to an existing table with an existing instance.
$dataClient = new BigtableClient([
    'projectId' => $projectId,
]);
$table = $dataClient->table($instanceId, $tableId);
$key = 'r1';
// Read a row from my-table using a row key
$row = $table->readRow($key);

$columnFamilyId = 'cf1';
$columnId = 'c1';
// Get the Value from the Row, using the column_family_id and column_id
$value = $row[$columnFamilyId][$columnId][0]['value'];

printf("Row key: %s\nData: %s\n", $key, $value);

Python

To learn how to install and use the client library for Bigtable, see Bigtable client libraries.

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import argparse

from google.cloud import bigtable


def main(project_id="project-id", instance_id="instance-id", table_id="my-table"):
    # Create a Cloud Bigtable client.
    client = bigtable.Client(project=project_id)

    # Connect to an existing Cloud Bigtable instance.
    instance = client.instance(instance_id)

    # Open an existing table.
    table = instance.table(table_id)

    row_key = "r1"
    row = table.read_row(row_key.encode("utf-8"))

    column_family_id = "cf1"
    column_id = "c1".encode("utf-8")
    value = row.cells[column_family_id][column_id][0].value.decode("utf-8")

    print("Row key: {}\nData: {}".format(row_key, value))


if __name__ == "__main__":
    parser = argparse.ArgumentParser(
        description=__doc__, formatter_class=argparse.ArgumentDefaultsHelpFormatter
    )
    parser.add_argument("project_id", help="Your Cloud Platform project ID.")
    parser.add_argument(
        "instance_id", help="ID of the Cloud Bigtable instance to connect to."
    )
    parser.add_argument(
        "--table", help="Existing table used in the quickstart.", default="my-table"
    )

    args = parser.parse_args()
    main(args.project_id, args.instance_id, args.table)

Ruby

To learn how to install and use the client library for Bigtable, see Bigtable client libraries.

View on GitHub Feedback

# Import google bigtable client lib
require "google/cloud/bigtable"

# Instantiates a client
bigtable = Google::Cloud::Bigtable.new

# Your Cloud Bigtable instance ID
# instance_id = "my-instance"

# Your Cloud Bigtable table ID
# table_id = "my-table"

# Get table client
table = bigtable.table instance_id, table_id

# Read and print row
p table.read_row "user0000001"

Additional resources

C++

• API Reference Documentation
• Source Code
• GitHub Issue Tracker
• Stack Overflow

C#

• API Reference Documentation
• Source Code
• GitHub Issue Tracker
• Stack Overflow

Go

• API Reference Documentation
• Source Code
• GitHub Issue Tracker
• Stack Overflow

Java

• API Reference Documentation
• Source Code
• GitHub Issue Tracker
• Stack Overflow

HBase

• API Reference Documentation (client library)
• API Reference Documentation (Dataflow connector)
• Source Code
• GitHub Issue Tracker
• Stack Overflow

Node.js

• API Reference Documentation
• Source Code
• GitHub Issue Tracker
• Stack Overflow

PHP

• API Reference Documentation
• Source Code
• GitHub Issue Tracker
• Stack Overflow

Python

• API Reference Documentation
• Source Code
• GitHub Issue Tracker
• Stack Overflow

Ruby

• API Reference Documentation
• Source Code
• GitHub Issue Tracker
• Stack Overflow

Third-party Cloud Bigtable API client libraries

Scio

The Scio client library provides a Scala API for Dataflow, which can read from and write to Bigtable. The Scio repository provides sample code for a Dataflow pipeline that uses Bigtable.