Compatibility and support for DataStax drivers
This topic provides an overview of supported DataStax drivers for open-source Apache Cassandra®, DataStax Enterprise (DSE), Hyper-Converged Database (HCD), and Astra DB.
Unless otherwise stated, DataStax officially supports the last twelve months of releases.
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Connecting your application to Astra DB might cause connection issues depending on the driver you choose. Although third-party open-source drivers, such as GoCQL, are supported, DataStax strongly recommends using DataStax drivers. Third-party open-source drivers might lack features that harden the driver against IP address changes of the coordinators, which can cause frequent connection issues. Connections using third-party open-source drivers, such as GoCQL, over private links with or without custom domains are not officially supported by DataStax. For more information, see the DataStax Support Policy. |
Version compatibility
DataStax drivers work exclusively with the Cassandra Query Language (CQL) version 3 for transactional workloads and support both Fluent and String APIs for DSE Graph workloads. Use these drivers in production applications to pass CQL or DSE Graph statements from the client to a cluster and to retrieve, manipulate, or remove data. The C/C++, C#, Java, Node.js, PHP, Python, and Ruby drivers support Cassandra’s binary protocol.
For example, with DSE 5.1, you can use any DataStax driver that supports Cassandra 3.1. However, to use functionality such as DSE Graph with DSE 5.1 and some later versions, you might need to use DSE-only drivers. To verify compatibility, check the version compatibility for DataStax drivers and DSE-only drivers.
Cassandra, DSE, HCD, and Astra DB drivers
You can use DataStax drivers for Cassandra, DSE, HCD, and Astra DB.
The following table provides links to source code, version compatibility, and documentation for each DataStax driver language.
| Documentation | Source code | Compatibility | Upgrade | Quickstart |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Download and install DataStax drivers
To download drivers, see the DataStax drivers downloads page and the Community drivers downloads page.
For installation instructions, see your driver’s documentation:
To upgrade from an earlier version of a DataStax driver or to upgrade from a DSE-only driver to a DataStax driver, see Upgrade guides.
JDBC and ODBC drivers
You can access the ODBC and JDBC drivers through the DataStax Support portal or by contacting DataStax Support.
Spark Cassandra Connector
Use the DataStax Spark Cassandra Connector to connect to your Cassandra, DSE, HCD, and Astra DB databases with Apache Spark.
For more information, see the following:
Legacy drivers
The following drivers are in end-of-life (EOL) or maintenance mode.
PHP and Ruby drivers
The DSE-only PHP and Ruby drivers reached EOL in January 2022, and the OSS PHP and Ruby drivers are in maintenance mode.
For information about these drivers, see DataStax PHP driver for Apache Cassandra® and DataStax Ruby driver for Apache Cassandra®.
DSE-only drivers
Starting in January 2020, DataStax unified the DSE and Cassandra drivers. DSE-only drivers were supported until January 1st, 2022, and they are now end-of-life (EOL).
All new features and functionality are added to the unified DataStax drivers. For more information about the decision to develop unified drivers, see Better Drivers for Cassandra.
For compatibility information for the EOL DSE-only drivers, see End-of-life drivers.
Upgrade guides
To upgrade from a DSE-only driver to a unified DataStax driver, see the following language-specific driver upgrade guides:
