Neo4j supports a configurable transaction timeout that automatically terminates long-running transactions. This can be set globally using the configuration parameter:

Example for a 10-second timeout:

In 5.x and later Neo4j DB versions:

db.transaction.timeout=10s

In earlier versions:

dbms.transaction.timeout=10s

In addition to this global timeout, Neo4j allows transactions to specify a custom timeout via the driver or Java API. However, the behavior of this override has changed across versions.

 

Behaviour in Neo4j 5.2 and Earlier

• Driver-level or API-defined timeouts override the global dbms.transaction.timeout, but only if they are shorter than the global value.

• If the specified custom timeout is longer than the global transaction timeout, the global timeout is not honoured, and applies instead.
  Effectively, the global transaction timeout set in the server acts as an upper bound for any custom timeout.

Behaviour in Neo4j 5.3 and Later

• Driver-level or API-defined timeouts are always honoured, even if they exceed the configured value of db.transaction.timeout.

• The custom timeout becomes the effective transaction timeout regardless of the global setting.

References from Neo4j docs:

• Functionality before 5.3
• Functionality in 5.3 and later