MQTT Protocol

1. Overview

MQTT (Message Queuing Telemetry Transport) is a lightweight messaging protocol designed for IoT and low-bandwidth environments. It operates on a Publish/Subscribe (Pub/Sub) model, enabling efficient and reliable bidirectional communication between devices. Its core objectives are low power consumption, minimal bandwidth usage, and high real-time performance, making it ideal for unstable networks or resource-constrained scenarios (e.g., sensors, mobile devices).

IoTDB provides deep integration with the MQTT protocol, fully compliant with MQTT v3.1 (OASIS International Standard). The IoTDB server includes a built-in high-performance MQTT Broker module, eliminating the need for third-party middleware. Devices can directly write time-series data into the IoTDB storage engine via MQTT messages.

2. Configuration

By default, the IoTDB MQTT service loads configurations from ${IOTDB_HOME}/${IOTDB_CONF}/iotdb-system.properties.

Property	Description	Default
`enable_mqtt_service`	Enable/ disable the MQTT service.	FALSE
`mqtt_host`	Host address bound to the MQTT service.	127.0.0.1
`mqtt_port`	Port bound to the MQTT service.	1883
`mqtt_handler_pool_size`	Thread pool size for processing MQTT messages.	1
`mqtt_payload_formatter`	Formatting method for MQTT message payloads. Options: `json` (tree model), `line` (table model).	json
`mqtt_max_message_size`	Maximum allowed MQTT message size (bytes).	1048576

3. Write Protocol

Line Protocol Syntax

<measurement>[,<tag_key>=<tag_value>[,<tag_key>=<tag_value>]][ <attribute_key>=<attribute_value>[,<attribute_key>=<attribute_value>]] <field_key>=<field_value>[,<field_key>=<field_value>] [<timestamp>]

Example

myMeasurement,tag1=value1,tag2=value2 attr1=value1,attr2=value2 fieldKey="fieldValue" 1556813561098000000

4. Naming Conventions

Database Name

The first segment of the MQTT topic (split by /) is used as the database name.

topic: stock/Legacy
databaseName: stock


topic: stock/Legacy/#
databaseName:stock

Table Name

The table name is derived from the <measurement> in the line protocol.

Type Identifiers

Filed Value	IoTDB Data Type
1 1.12	DOUBLE
1`f` 1.12`f`	FLOAT
1`i` 123`i`	INT64
1`u` 123`u`	INT64
1`i32` 123`i32`	INT32
`"xxx"`	TEXT
`t`,`T`,`true`,`True`,`TRUE` `f`,`F`,`false`,`False`,`FALSE`	BOOLEAN

5. Coding Examples

The following is an example which a mqtt client send messages to IoTDB server.

MQTT mqtt = new MQTT();
mqtt.setHost("127.0.0.1", 1883);
mqtt.setUserName("root");
mqtt.setPassword("root");

BlockingConnection connection = mqtt.blockingConnection();
String DATABASE = "myMqttTest";
connection.connect();

String payload =
       "test1,tag1=t1,tag2=t2 attr3=a5,attr4=a4 field1=\"fieldValue1\",field2=1i,field3=1u 1";
connection.publish(DATABASE + "/myTopic", payload.getBytes(), QoS.AT_LEAST_ONCE, false);
Thread.sleep(10);

payload = "test1,tag1=t1,tag2=t2  field4=2,field5=2i32,field6=2f 2";
connection.publish(DATABASE, payload.getBytes(), QoS.AT_LEAST_ONCE, false);
Thread.sleep(10);

payload = "# It's a remark\n " + "test1,tag1=t1,tag2=t2 field4=2,field5=2i32,field6=2f 6";
       connection.publish(DATABASE + "/myTopic", payload.getBytes(), QoS.AT_LEAST_ONCE, false);
       Thread.sleep(10);

//batch write example       
payload =
       "test1,tag1=t1,tag2=t2  field7=t,field8=T,field9=true 3 \n "
       + "test1,tag1=t1,tag2=t2  field7=f,field8=F,field9=FALSE 4";
connection.publish(DATABASE + "/myTopic", payload.getBytes(), QoS.AT_LEAST_ONCE, false);
Thread.sleep(10);

//batch write example
payload =
       "test1,tag1=t1,tag2=t2 attr1=a1,attr2=a2 field1=\"fieldValue1\",field2=1i,field3=1u 4 \n "
       + "test1,tag1=t1,tag2=t2 field4=2,field5=2i32,field6=2f 5";
connection.publish(DATABASE + "/myTopic", payload.getBytes(), QoS.AT_LEAST_ONCE, false);
Thread.sleep(10);

connection.disconnect();

6. Customize your MQTT Message Format

If you do not like the above Line format, you can customize your MQTT Message format by just writing several lines of codes. An example can be found in example/mqtt-customize project.

Steps:

Create a java project, and add dependency:

        <dependency>
            <groupId>org.apache.iotdb</groupId>
            <artifactId>iotdb-server</artifactId>
            <version>2.0.4-SNAPSHOT</version>
        </dependency>

Define your implementation which implements org.apache.iotdb.db.protocol.mqtt.PayloadFormatter e.g.,

package org.apache.iotdb.mqtt.server;

import io.netty.buffer.ByteBuf;
import org.apache.iotdb.db.protocol.mqtt.Message;
import org.apache.iotdb.db.protocol.mqtt.PayloadFormatter;

import java.nio.charset.StandardCharsets;
import java.util.ArrayList;
import java.util.Arrays;
import java.util.List;

public class CustomizedLinePayloadFormatter implements PayloadFormatter {

    @Override
    public List<Message> format(String topic, ByteBuf payload) {
        // Suppose the payload is a line format
        if (payload == null) {
            return null;
        }

        String line = payload.toString(StandardCharsets.UTF_8);
        // parse data from the line and generate Messages and put them into List<Meesage> ret
        List<Message> ret = new ArrayList<>();
        // this is just an example, so we just generate some Messages directly
        for (int i = 0; i < 3; i++) {
            long ts = i;
            TableMessage message = new TableMessage();

            // Parsing Database Name
            message.setDatabase("db" + i);

            //Parsing Table Names
            message.setTable("t" + i);

            // Parsing Tags
            List<String> tagKeys = new ArrayList<>();
            tagKeys.add("tag1" + i);
            tagKeys.add("tag2" + i);
            List<Object> tagValues = new ArrayList<>();
            tagValues.add("t_value1" + i);
            tagValues.add("t_value2" + i);
            message.setTagKeys(tagKeys);
            message.setTagValues(tagValues);

            // Parsing Attributes
            List<String> attributeKeys = new ArrayList<>();
            List<Object> attributeValues = new ArrayList<>();
            attributeKeys.add("attr1" + i);
            attributeKeys.add("attr2" + i);
            attributeValues.add("a_value1" + i);
            attributeValues.add("a_value2" + i);
            message.setAttributeKeys(attributeKeys);
            message.setAttributeValues(attributeValues);

           // Parsing Fields
           List<String> fields = Arrays.asList("field1" + i, "field2" + i);
           List<TSDataType> dataTypes = Arrays.asList(TSDataType.FLOAT, TSDataType.FLOAT);
           List<Object> values = Arrays.asList("4.0" + i, "5.0" + i);
           message.setFields(fields);
           message.setDataTypes(dataTypes);
           message.setValues(values);

           //// Parsing timestamp
           message.setTimestamp(ts);
           ret.add(message);
        }
        return ret;
    }

    @Override
    public String getName() {
        // set the value of mqtt_payload_formatter in iotdb-system.properties as the following string:
        return "CustomizedLine";
    }
}

modify the file in src/main/resources/META-INF/services/org.apache.iotdb.db.protocol.mqtt.PayloadFormatter: clean the file and put your implementation class name into the file. In this example, the content is: org.apache.iotdb.mqtt.server.CustomizedLinePayloadFormatter
compile your implementation as a jar file: mvn package -DskipTests

Then, in your server:

Create ${IOTDB_HOME}/ext/mqtt/ folder, and put the jar into this folder.
Update configuration to enable MQTT service. (enable_mqtt_service=true in conf/iotdb-system.properties)
Set the value of mqtt_payload_formatter in conf/iotdb-system.properties as the value of getName() in your implementation , in this example, the value is CustomizedLine
Launch the IoTDB server.
Now IoTDB will use your implementation to parse the MQTT message.

More: the message format can be anything you want. For example, if it is a binary format, just use payload.forEachByte() or payload.array to get bytes content.

7. Caution

To avoid compatibility issues caused by a default client_id, always explicitly supply a unique, non-empty client_id in every MQTT client. Behavior varies when the client_id is missing or empty. Common examples:

Explicitly sending an empty string • MQTTX: When client_id=““, IoTDB silently discards the message. • mosquitto_pub: When client_id=””, IoTDB receives the message normally.
Omitting client_id entirely • MQTTX: IoTDB accepts the message. • mosquitto_pub: IoTDB rejects the connection. Therefore, explicitly assigning a unique, non-empty client_id is the simplest way to eliminate these discrepancies and ensure reliable message delivery.