Smartsheet incident
Intermittent Cell Link and Cross Sheet Reference delays/failures
Resolved after 3 hours 37 minutes, affecting Sheets, on August 25, 2026.
Between August 24 and August 28, 2026, a performance optimization caused certain formulas and cross-sheet references to evaluate incorrectly or produce errors following row insertions or deletions. The root cause was an asynchronous calculation change that performed partial data loads, omitting dependent cells and silently persisting inaccurate formula values. The issue was mitigated on August 27 at 11:25 AM PDT by disabling the optimization flags, with full data restoration completed on August 28 after recalculating approximately all affected known sheets. Preventive measures include enforcing dependency coverage safeguards and adding automated test suites for structural sheet edits. Another event also caused the same issues. On August 25, 2026 \(starting at ~19:43 UTC\), an unprecedented update fanout from a single high-connectivity source sheet overwhelmed the backend Grid Service with approximately update attempts in the thousands, leading to database connection spikes and 502 Bad Gateway errors that left destination sheets with stale cell links and cross-sheet references. Engineering mitigated the propagation by blocking the problematic source sheet on August 26, 2026. A comprehensive, two-phase bulk inbound refresh was subsequently executed across affected unique destination sheets starting on August 26 at 19:14 UTC and successfully concluding on August 27, 2026 at 11:07 UTC, restoring live link consistency across active sheets. We continue to prioritize investments to scale our networking, compute, security, and other infrastructure, and in the technical management processes that enable us to consistently deliver against that commitment. While we cannot promise a future free of any technical challenges, we promise that we will do whatever it takes to ensure that Smartsheet is a partner that can be counted on to deliver. We know that your success—and your continued trust in Smartsheet—depends on it.
Affected components
Update timeline
- investigating Aug 25, 2026, 08:45 PM UTC
We are investigating delays or failures impacting Cell Links and Cross Sheet References. Our team is fully engaged in addressing the situation. We will provide frequent updates until we reach a monitoring status.
- investigating Aug 25, 2026, 09:25 PM UTC
We are still investigating this issue. Our team is fully engaged in addressing the situation. We will provide frequent updates until we reach a monitoring status.
- identified Aug 25, 2026, 10:09 PM UTC
This issue has been identified and a fix is being implemented.
- monitoring Aug 25, 2026, 10:23 PM UTC
A fix has been implemented and we are monitoring the service for ensured stability.
- resolved Aug 26, 2026, 12:23 AM UTC
This incident has been resolved.
- postmortem Sep 17, 2026, 11:30 PM UTC
Between August 24 and August 28, 2026, a performance optimization caused certain formulas and cross-sheet references to evaluate incorrectly or produce errors following row insertions or deletions. The root cause was an asynchronous calculation change that performed partial data loads, omitting dependent cells and silently persisting inaccurate formula values. The issue was mitigated on August 27 at 11:25 AM PDT by disabling the optimization flags, with full data restoration completed on August 28 after recalculating approximately all affected known sheets. Preventive measures include enforcing dependency coverage safeguards and adding automated test suites for structural sheet edits. Another event also caused the same issues. On August 25, 2026 \(starting at ~19:43 UTC\), an unprecedented update fanout from a single high-connectivity source sheet overwhelmed the backend Grid Service with approximately update attempts in the thousands, leading to database connection spikes and 502 Bad Gateway errors that left destination sheets with stale cell links and cross-sheet references. Engineering mitigated the propagation by blocking the problematic source sheet on August 26, 2026. A comprehensive, two-phase bulk inbound refresh was subsequently executed across affected unique destination sheets starting on August 26 at 19:14 UTC and successfully concluding on August 27, 2026 at 11:07 UTC, restoring live link consistency across active sheets. We continue to prioritize investments to scale our networking, compute, security, and other infrastructure, and in the technical management processes that enable us to consistently deliver against that commitment. While we cannot promise a future free of any technical challenges, we promise that we will do whatever it takes to ensure that Smartsheet is a partner that can be counted on to deliver. We know that your success—and your continued trust in Smartsheet—depends on it.
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