gofiber/fiber · error

limiter: failed to persist state: %w

Error message

limiter: failed to persist state: %w

What it means

Returned by FixedWindow.New's handler (limiter_fixed.go:83-86) when manager.set fails to persist the counter after incrementing currHits on the request's first (or window-active) hit. Storage write failure or msgpack marshal failure inside manager.set.

Source

Thrown at middleware/limiter/limiter_fixed.go:85

			// Check if entry is expired
			e.currHits = 0
			e.exp = ts + expiration
		}

		// Increment hits
		e.currHits++

		// Calculate when it resets in seconds
		resetInSec := e.exp - ts
		windowExpiresAt := e.exp

		// Set how many hits we have left
		remaining := maxRequests - e.currHits

		// Update storage
		if setErr := manager.set(reqCtx, key, e, expirationDuration); setErr != nil {
			mux.Unlock()
			return fmt.Errorf("limiter: failed to persist state: %w", setErr)
		}

		// Unlock entry
		mux.Unlock()

		// Check if hits exceed the max
		if remaining < 0 {
			// Return response with Retry-After header
			// https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc6584
			if !cfg.DisableHeaders {
				c.Set(fiber.HeaderRetryAfter, utils.FormatUint(resetInSec))
			}

			// Call LimitReached handler
			return cfg.LimitReached(c)
		}

		// Continue stack for reaching c.Response().StatusCode()

View on GitHub (pinned to 9a4c7e57fe)

Solutions

1. Verify the configured Storage is reachable and has capacity.
2. Run `make generate` so item MarshalMsg matches the struct (manager_msgp.go).
3. If using in-memory only, confirm you did not pass a nil-but-typed Storage that errors.
4. Decide policy: a storage failure here returns the error to the client — wrap with a fallback handler if you prefer fail-open.

Example fix

// before
app.Use(limiter.New(limiter.Config{Storage: redis.New()}))

// after — healthcheck + fail-open wrapper around limiter
store := redis.New()
if err := store.Ping(); err != nil { log.Fatal(err) }
app.Use(func(c fiber.Ctx) error {
    if err := limiter.New(limiter.Config{Storage: store})(c); err != nil {
        log.Printf("limiter down: %v — failing open", err)
        return c.Next()
    }
    return nil
})

// pre-flight: storage write + msgp codegen check
ctx, cancel := context.WithTimeout(context.Background(), time.Second)
defer cancel()
if err := store.SetWithContext(ctx, "__hc__", []byte("ok"), time.Minute); err != nil {
    log.Fatal(err)
}

// fail open: rate limiting is best-effort for many services
app.Use(func(c fiber.Ctx) error {
    if err := limiterHandler(c); err != nil {
        log.Printf("limiter down: %v", err)
        return c.Next()
    }
    return nil
})

When it happens

Trigger: Configuring limiter with a remote Storage (Redis, etc.) that errors on SetWithContext, or a marshal failure of the item struct (see [173]-style codegen issue). On the in-memory default Storage this is unreachable.

Common situations: Redis briefly unreachable mid-request; storage pool exhausted; msgp-generated code out of sync with item struct; storage TLS misconfigured.

Related errors

• limiter: failed to persist state: %w
• failed to save response: %w
• limiter: failed to get key %q from storage: %w
• limiter: failed to unmarshal key %q: %w
• limiter: failed to marshal key %q: %w

AI-assisted analysis of gofiber/fiber@9a4c7e57fe (2026-08-04). Data as JSON: /data/errors/7e4b8b9ef59918e9.json. Report an issue: GitHub.