---
title: Downgrade InfluxDB
description: To downgrade from InfluxDB 2.9 to a previous 2.x version, use the influxd downgrade command to downgrade the metadata schema used by influxd to match the metadata schema of a older release.
url: https://docs.influxdata.com/influxdb/v2/install/upgrade/downgrade/
estimated_tokens: 613
product: InfluxDB OSS v2
version: v2
---

# Downgrade InfluxDB

This page documents an earlier version of InfluxDB OSS. [InfluxDB 3 Core](/influxdb3/core/) is the latest stable version.

#### API token hashing is enabled by default in InfluxDB OSS 2.9.0

Stronger token security: tokens are stored as hashes on disk, so a copy of the database file doesn’t expose usable tokens. Existing tokens are hashed on first startup and the original strings can’t be recovered afterward — **capture any plaintext tokens you still need before you upgrade**.

For more information, see [Token hashing](/influxdb/v2/admin/tokens/#token-hashing).

To downgrade from InfluxDB 2.9 to a previous 2.x version, use the `influxd downgrade` command to downgrade the metadata schema used by `influxd` to match the metadata schema of a older release.

InfluxDB does not guarantee backwards-compatibility with older releases in its embedded metadata stores. Attempting to start an older `influxd` binary with a BoltDB or SQLite file that has been migrated to a newer schema will result in a startup error similar to:

```
Error: up: reading migrations: migration "...": migration specification not found
```

**To downgrade from InfluxDB 2.9 to a previous 2.x version**:

1. Run `influxd downgrade` using the **2.9 `influxd` binary**. Specify the previous InfluxDB version to downgrade to. For example, to downgrade to InfluxDB 2.0:
    
    ```sh
    influxd downgrade 2.0
    ```
    
2. Install the **earlier version** of InfluxDB by following the [InfluxDB v2 installation instructions](/influxdb/v2/install/).
    
3. Start InfluxDB with the **earlier versioned `influxd` binary**.
    

#### Related

-   [influxd downgrade](/influxdb/v2/reference/cli/influxd/downgrade/)