When using the mongo shell interactively, there is a handy set of shell command helpers that facilitate discovery and navigation while in the shell. The command helpers are summarized here:
| Command | Options | Notes |
| use | <dbname> | Switches default database to <dbname> |
| help | Displays a list of commands with brief descriptions | |
| help | admin | List of administrative commands |
| help | connect | Help pertaining to the database connection |
| help | keys | Keyboard shortcuts |
| help | misc | Other uncategorized help |
| help | mr | Displays help on Map-Reduce |
| show | dbs | Shows database names |
| show | collections | When using a database, shows a list of collections |
| show | users | List of users for the current database |
| show | logs | List of accessible logger names |
| show | log <name> | Displays last entry of log <name>; global is the default |
| db.help() | Help on database methods | |
| db.<coll>.help() | Help on collection methods, where <coll> is a collection in the currently... |