Core Data Types

Note

The Python types mentioned here are based on Python 3. Differences for Python 2 are highlighted in the footnotes.

Cypher supports a set of core data types that all map to built-in types in Python. These include the common Boolean, Integer, Float and String types as well as List and Map that can hold heterogenous collections of any other type. The core types with their general mappings are listed below:

Cypher Type	Python Type
Null	None
Boolean	bool
Integer	int
Float	float
String	str
Bytes [1]	bytearray
List	list
Map	dict

Notes

1. Bytes is not an actual Cypher type but is transparently passed through when used in parameters or query results.

In reality, the actual conversions and coercions that occur as values are passed through the system are more complex than just a simple mapping. The diagram below illustrates the actual mappings between the various layers, from driver to data store, for the core types.

Footnotes for Python 2 users

1. While Cypher uses 64-bit signed integers, int can only hold integers up to sys.maxint in Python 2; long is used for values above this.

2. Python 2 uses unicode instead of str for Unicode text. However, a Python 2 str passed as a parameter will always be implicitly converted to unicode via UTF-8.