# Trouble running HUMAnN with updated metaphlan database
**URL:** https://forum.biobakery.org/t/trouble-running-humann-with-updated-metaphlan-database/8293
**Category:** HUMAnN
**Created:** [July 23, 2025, 7:10pm UTC](https://forum.biobakery.org/t/trouble-running-humann-with-updated-metaphlan-database/8293 "2025-07-23T19:10:56Z")
**Posts on this page:** 4
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@jhonnmick](https://forum.biobakery.org/u/jhonnmick)
#### Post date: [July 23, 2025, 7:10pm UTC](https://forum.biobakery.org/t/trouble-running-humann-with-updated-metaphlan-database/8293/1 "2025-07-23T19:10:56Z")
Hi all,
I’m trying to run HUMAnN 3.8 with the latest MetaPhlAn v4 database, but I keep running into an error during the taxonomic profiling step. It says the MetaPhlAn version is incompatible, even though I’ve updated both tools via conda and confirmed the database is downloaded.
Has anyone successfully configured HUMAnN to work with MetaPhlAn 4.x? Do I need to stick with MetaPhlAn 3 for now, or is there a way to bypass the compatibility check?
Any help or guidance would be greatly appreciated. Let me know if I should share logs or version details.
Thanks in advance!
Jhonn Mick
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### Author:  [@franzosa](https://forum.biobakery.org/u/franzosa)
#### Post date: [August 1, 2025, 6:40pm UTC](https://forum.biobakery.org/t/trouble-running-humann-with-updated-metaphlan-database/8293/2 "2025-08-01T18:40:50Z")
The different HUMAnN 3.x releases are each compatible with a separate MetaPhlAn 4 database (please see their release notes for details). However, we have not released a HUMAnN 3.x yet for the latest (Jan25) MetaPhlAn 4 database, and I’m not sure if we will given that we are shifting focus to HUMAnN 4 at this point.
You and others here are welcome to reply and let us know if maintaining backward compatibility is important for your workflows. If there’s a lot of interest that would provide more motivation for another HUMAnN 3.x release.
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### Author:  [@lfreund](https://forum.biobakery.org/u/lfreund)
#### Post date: [December 5, 2025, 6:33pm UTC](https://forum.biobakery.org/t/trouble-running-humann-with-updated-metaphlan-database/8293/3 "2025-12-05T18:33:32Z")
I think my post is related to this in a way, which you can find [here](https://forum.biobakery.org/t/humann3-database-errors/8662).
I am trying to run Humann3 and it is prompting me to update the chocophlan database to vJan25, but when I did, it said I needed to use the old database of v201901\_31. If you could please help me that would be great, thanks!
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### Author:  [@franzosa](https://forum.biobakery.org/u/franzosa)
#### Post date: [December 5, 2025, 10:00pm UTC](https://forum.biobakery.org/t/trouble-running-humann-with-updated-metaphlan-database/8293/4 "2025-12-05T22:00:44Z")
Just responded to your main message. Please follow-up there if anything is unclear / still doesn’t work.