Using Liquibase with Oracle
Oracle Database is an object-relational database that offers market-leading performance, scalability, reliability, and security, both on-premises and in the cloud. For more information, see the Oracle documentation page.
Supported Versions
- 11g – officially certified
- 12c – officially certified
- 18.3.0 – officially supported and tested with Test Harness
- 18.4.0 – officially supported and tested with Test Harness
- 19.9.0 – officially supported and tested with Test Harness
- 21.3.0 – officially supported and tested with Test Harness
Prerequisites
Before using Liquibase with your database, ensure you have:
- Installed Liquibase.
- Created a Liquibase project folder to store all Liquibase files.
- Created a new Liquibase properties file or are using the existing
liquibase.properties
file included in the installation package. For more information, see Specifying Properties in a Connection Profile.
Install Drivers
To use Liquibase and Oracle, you need to have the JDBC driver JAR file.
Liquibase comes with a pre-installed driver for this database in the liquibase/lib
directory. For more information, see Adding and Updating Liquibase Drivers.
Note: If you placed the JAR file in a different directory, you must specify the path in the Liquibase properties file: classpath:../<path_to_drivers>/<db_jar_name>.jar
. For more information, see Specifying Properties in a Connection Profile.
If you use Maven, you also need to download the driver JAR file and put the driver in a location that your Maven build can access. Configure the Maven pom.xml
file to use the local copy of the driver JAR file. For example:
<dependency>
<groupId>com.oracle.database.jdbc</groupId>
<artifactId>ojdbc8</artifactId>
<version>21.5.0.0</version>
</dependency>
Test Your Connection
For Liquibase and Oracle to work, you need to:
- Ensure Oracle is configured. See the following:
- Specify the database URL in the Liquibase properties file or as a parameter to the command in the CLI. See the following:
-
Create a text file called changelog (
.xml
,.sql
,.json
, or.yaml
) in your project directory and add a changeset.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<databaseChangeLog
xmlns="http://www.liquibase.org/xml/ns/dbchangelog"
xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
xmlns:ext="http://www.liquibase.org/xml/ns/dbchangelog-ext"
xmlns:pro="http://www.liquibase.org/xml/ns/pro"
xsi:schemaLocation="http://www.liquibase.org/xml/ns/dbchangelog
http://www.liquibase.org/xml/ns/dbchangelog/dbchangelog-4.9.xsd
http://www.liquibase.org/xml/ns/dbchangelog-ext http://www.liquibase.org/xml/ns/dbchangelog/dbchangelog-ext.xsd
http://www.liquibase.org/xml/ns/pro http://www.liquibase.org/xml/ns/pro/liquibase-pro-4.9.xsd">
<changeSet id="1" author="Liquibase">
<createTable tableName="test_table">
<column name="test_id" type="int">
<constraints primaryKey="true"/>
</column>
<column name="test_column" type="varchar"/>
</createTable>
</changeSet>
</databaseChangeLog>

-- liquibase formatted sql
-- changeset liquibase:1
CREATE TABLE test_table (test_id INT, test_column VARCHAR, PRIMARY KEY (test_id))
Note: Formatted SQL changelogs generated by using Liquibase versions previous to 4.2 might cause issues because of the lack of space after a double dash ( -- ).
Tip: To fix those issues, add a space after the double dash. For example: -- liquibase formatted sql
instead of --liquibase formatted sql
and -- changeset myname:create-table
instead of --changeset myname:create-table

databaseChangeLog:
- changeSet:
id: 1
author: Liquibase
changes:
- createTable:
columns:
- column:
name: test_column
type: INT
constraints:
primaryKey: true
nullable: false
tableName: test_table

{
"databaseChangeLog": [
{
"changeSet": {
"id": "1",
"author": "Liquibase",
"changes": [
{
"createTable": {
"columns": [
{
"column":
{
"name": "test_column",
"type": "INT",
"constraints":
{
"primaryKey": true,
"nullable": false
}
}
}]
,
"tableName": "test_table"
}
}]
}
}]
}
- Navigate to your project folder in the CLI and run the Liquibase status command to see whether the connection is successful. You can pass arguments in the CLI or keep them in the Liquibase properties file.
- Run your first update with the update command, which makes changes to your database. You can also run the update-sql command to inspect the SQL before running the
update
command.
liquibase --username=test --password=test --changelog-file=<changelog.xml> status
liquibase --changelog-file=<changelog.xml> update-sql
liquibase --changelog-file=<changelog.xml> update
From a database UI tool, ensure that your database contains the table you added along with the DATABASECHANGELOG table and DATABASECHANGELOGLOCK table.
Oracle Server
- Check the status by using SRVCTL, SQL*Plus, or Oracle Enterprise Manager. Also, you can run the following query:
SELECT INSTANCE_NAME, STATUS, DATABASE_STATUS FROM V$INSTANCE;
- Specify the database URL in Liquibase properties file, as follows:
url: jdbc:oracle:thin:@<host>:<port>/<service_name>
Tip: To apply a Liquibase Pro key to your project, add the following property to the Liquibase properties file: liquibaseProLicenseKey: <paste code here>
Oracle on AWS RDS
Check the connection by using any standard SQL client application, including SQL*Plus, and running the following:
Linux, macOS, or Unix
sqlplus 'user_name@(DESCRIPTION=(ADDRESS=(PROTOCOL=TCP)(HOST=dns_name)(PORT=port))(CONNECT_DATA=(SID=database_name)))'
Windows
sqlplus user_name@(DESCRIPTION=(ADDRESS=(PROTOCOL=TCP)(HOST=dns_name)(PORT=port))(CONNECT_DATA=(SID=database_name)))
Note: user_name
represents your DB instance administrator, and dns_name
stands for your DB instance. Also, replace the port number and the Oracle SID with your values. The Oracle SID is the name of the DB instance's database that you specified when you created the DB instance.
Tip: The alternative way is to connect with Oracle SQL Developer.
You can find the connection information in the AWS Management Console:
- Sign in to the AWS Management Console and open the Amazon RDS console.
- In the upper-right corner of the console, choose the AWS Region of your DB instance.
- Find the DNS name and port number for your DB Instance:
- Select Databases and choose the needed Oracle DB instance to display the instance details.
- Select Connectivity & security. You will see all information under Endpoint & Port.
Note: To find the connection information using the AWS CLI, call the describe-db-instances command, as follows: aws rds describe-db-instances
. In the output, you will see the Port
line and the Address
line containing the DNS name.
Specify the database URL in the Liquibase properties file, as follows:
url: jdbc:oracle:thin:@<endpoint>:<port>:<sid>
Example: url: jdbc:oracle:thin:@myrds.cz1j1vh9uvuo.us-east-1.rds.amazonaws.com:3306:orcl


Related Links
- Oracle Database Documentation
- Connecting to your Oracle DB instance
- Using the SQL Plus integration and run-with attribute with Liquibase Pro and Oracle
- Using Liquibase and Spring Boot with SQL Plus and Kerberos Authentication
- Using Liquibase and AWS RDS
- Liquibase Change Types
- Concepts
- Liquibase Commands
- Workflows