• Reference
  • Version · 6.0
  • Change Automation Reference

error-on-circular-include-all

Last updated: August 12, 2026

The global parameter error-on-circular-include-all is a Boolean that specifies whether Liquibase throws an error if it detects that an includeAll will cause a circular reference (and thus a changelog parse error). The default value is true.

Uses

You can use the includeAll tag to structure several changelogs in a directory under a root changelog. When error-on-circular-include-all is set to true, Liquibase automatically checks whether the directory you specify for includeAll contains the changelog you are executing, either directly or through another includeAll. This is called a circular or recursive reference and will cause program failure. If any circular references are detected, Liquibase stops the deployment.

It's possible to accidentally introduce a circular reference if you have multiple nested changelogs using includeAll. To help you easily find the cause of a failure, it is a best practice to leave error-on-circular-include-all set to true (the default behavior). However, you can set it to false if necessary.

Warning: If you set error-on-circular-include-all to false and your changelog contains a circular includeAll reference, Liquibase will generate a StackOverflowError and terminate.

Syntax

You can set this parameter in the following ways:

Option

Syntax

Liquibase properties file (defaults file)

liquibase.errorOnCircularIncludeAll: <true|false>

Global flow file argument

globalArgs: { error-on-circular-include-all: "<true|false>" }

Global CLI parameter

liquibase --error-on-circular-include-all=<true|false> update --changelog-file=example-changelog.xml

JVM system property (JAVA_OPTS environment variable)

Unix:

JAVA_OPTS=-Dliquibase.errorOnCircularIncludeAll=<true|false>

Windows:

JAVA_OPTS=-D"liquibase.errorOnCircularIncludeAll"=<true|false>

Liquibase environment variable

LIQUIBASE_ERROR_ON_CIRCULAR_INCLUDE_ALL=<true|false>

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