[Request]:

[pellyadolfo]

Summary

We would like to know the default Transaction Isolation level for REST API (specially GET requests) in Strapi v4.25.24.

Why is it needed?

We are using GET requests on REST API as export mechanism for our data and need to understand how users updating the same exported content can affect the exported data.

Additionally, we would like to know if this can be customized in the Strapi system and if it can be defined per GET request.

Suggested solution(s)

Apart from having a Strapi global setting, it may be useful let the REST API requests decide its transaction isolation level by adding an attribute in the request.

Related issue(s)/PR(s)

No response

[github-actions]

🤖 I've analyzed your question and here's what I found:

Thanks a lot for taking the time to raise this and for explaining your use case so clearly — understanding how concurrent updates affect exported data is a very valid concern when you rely heavily on GET requests.

From the available documentation, there is unfortunately no explicit information about:

• the default database transaction isolation level used by Strapi (for v4 or v5),
• any configuration option in Strapi to change the isolation level, globally or per request,
• or a way for REST API calls (including GET) to declare their own isolation level.

The only documented transaction-related API is the (experimental) strapi.db.transaction helper, which lets you group multiple operations into a single transaction and implicitly uses that transaction for strapi.entityService / strapi.db.query calls inside the block. However, even there, the docs do not mention isolation levels or any way to configure them. [Database transactions]

Because of that, based on the docs alone:

• We can’t confirm what isolation level is used by default (this is likely determined by the underlying database and its default settings, but that’s outside what Strapi’s docs state).
• We can’t point to any supported way in Strapi to:
  • set a global isolation level for all REST requests, or
  • choose an isolation level per GET request (e.g. via a header or query parameter).

What you can do today, according to the docs:

• Use strapi.db.transaction in custom backend logic (e.g. custom controllers or services) to ensure a group of operations either all succeed or all roll back together. [Database transactions]
• Use the standard REST API parameters (filters, sort, pagination, populate, fields, etc.) to control what data is read, but not how the underlying database transaction is isolated. [REST parameters]

Given your needs:

• This is effectively a feature request (configurable isolation level, ideally per request).
• The best next step is to log it on our public feedback board so it can be tracked and prioritized by the product team:
  👉 https://feedback.strapi.io

For deeper discussion or workarounds (e.g. DB‑level configuration, custom controllers using strapi.db.transaction, or patterns other teams use), I’d also recommend:

• The Strapi Community Discord: https://discord.strapi.io [Community]
• The Forum: https://forum.strapi.io [Community]

If you feel this is more of a core behavior / product gap than a pure feature idea, please mention that in the issue so it can get the right attention from the core team.

📚 Relevant documentation:

• API configuration
• Community & Support
• Database transactions
• Middlewares customization - Implementation
• Requests and Responses - ctx.request.query
• REST API parameters
• REST API reference
• REST API reference - Endpoints
• REST API reference - Get a document
• REST API reference - Requests
• REST API: Filters
• REST API: Population & Field Selection
• Routes - Custom Content API parameters
• Strapi APIs to access your content
• Strapi Support Policy - Community resources

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ℹ️ This response was generated automatically. If this doesn't fully answer your question or if you need further assistance, please mention @pwizla in a comment and a human maintainer will help you.

You can also try our interactive AI chat for more detailed assistance.

💡 For feature requests or product feedback, visit feedback.strapi.io.

[pwizla]

Hi @pellyadolfo, and thank you for your detailed request. I can confirm the AI bot output in that it is more a product feature request rather than a documentation request. So I'll invite you to open a topic in the strapi/strapi repository discussions or create an issue if you think this is a bug that needs to be fixed. I will now close this documentation issue.