diff --git a/airflow-core/src/airflow/cli/commands/db_command.py b/airflow-core/src/airflow/cli/commands/db_command.py
index 4c15ccc2d488d..54de07299c645 100644
--- a/airflow-core/src/airflow/cli/commands/db_command.py
+++ b/airflow-core/src/airflow/cli/commands/db_command.py
@@ -306,6 +306,12 @@ def shell(args):
     url = settings.get_engine().url
     print(f"DB: {url!r}")
 
+    if not url.database:
+        raise ValueError(
+            "The metadata database name is missing from the connection URI. "
+            "Please check your AIRFLOW__DATABASE__SQL_ALCHEMY_CONN configuration."
+        )
+
     if url.get_backend_name() == "mysql":
         with NamedTemporaryFile(suffix="my.cnf") as f:
             f.write(_build_mysql_cnf(url))
diff --git a/airflow-core/tests/unit/cli/commands/test_db_command.py b/airflow-core/tests/unit/cli/commands/test_db_command.py
index 76e391e1144ed..45f4a45aafac1 100644
--- a/airflow-core/tests/unit/cli/commands/test_db_command.py
+++ b/airflow-core/tests/unit/cli/commands/test_db_command.py
@@ -534,6 +534,15 @@ def test_cli_shell_invalid_ppg3(self):
         with pytest.raises(AirflowException, match=r"Unknown driver: invalid\+psycopg"):
             db_command.shell(self.parser.parse_args(["db", "shell"]))
 
+    @mock.patch(
+        "airflow.cli.commands.db_command.settings.engine.url",
+        make_url("postgresql+psycopg2://postgres:airflow@postgres/"),
+    )
+    def test_db_shell_missing_database_name(self):
+        """Assert that an explicit ValueError is raised when the database name is missing."""
+        with pytest.raises(ValueError, match="The metadata database name is missing"):
+            db_command.shell(self.parser.parse_args(["db", "shell"]))
+
     def test_run_db_downgrade_command_success_and_messages(self, capsys):
         class Args:
             to_revision = "abc"