hashicorp/vagrant · error · Vagrant::Errors::UploadSourceMissing

The source path provided for upload cannot be found. Please

Error message

The source path provided for upload cannot be found. Please validate
the source location for upload an try again.

  Source Path: %{source}

What it means

`vagrant upload` requires the source path to exist on the HOST. After stripping one possibly-escaped trailing quote, the command tests File.file? then File.directory?; when both fail it raises UploadSourceMissing with the exact path it tried. The failure happens before any guest communication, so it is purely a host-filesystem problem.

Source

Thrown at plugins/commands/upload/command.rb:68

          else
            destination = argv[1]
          end
        else
          raise Vagrant::Errors::CLIInvalidUsage, help: opts.help.chomp
        end

        # NOTE: We do this to handle paths on Windows like: "..\space dir\"
        # because the final separator acts to escape the quote and ends up
        # in the source value.
        source = source.sub(/["']$/, "")
        destination ||= File.basename(source)

        if File.file?(source)
          type = :file
        elsif File.directory?(source)
          type = :directory
        else
          raise Vagrant::Errors::UploadSourceMissing,
            source: source
        end

        with_target_vms(guest, single_target: true) do |machine|
          if options[:temporary]
            if !machine.guest.capability?(:create_tmp_path)
              raise Vagrant::Errors::UploadMissingTempCapability
            end
            extension = File.extname(source) if type == :file
            destination = machine.guest.capability(:create_tmp_path, type: type, extension: extension)
          end

          if options[:compress]
            compression_setup!(machine, options)
            @env.ui.info(I18n.t("vagrant.commands.upload.compress",
              source: source,
              type: options[:compression_type]
            ))

View on GitHub (pinned to 35f3160f4a)

Solutions

Read the printed 'Source Path:' — it is the literal string Vagrant tested; fix typos, casing, or quoting
Use an absolute path, or run vagrant from the directory containing the source
On Windows, quote the path and drop any trailing backslash before the closing quote

Example fix

# before
vagrant upload ./bulid/app.zip /tmp/app.zip   # typo 'bulid'

# after
vagrant upload ./build/app.zip /tmp/app.zip

Defensive patterns

Strategy: validation

Validate before calling

abort "source not found on host: #{src}" unless File.exist?(src)
system('vagrant', 'upload', src, dst)

Type guard

def uploadable_source?(path)
  File.file?(path) || File.directory?(path)
end

Try / catch

begin
  command.execute
rescue Vagrant::Errors::UploadSourceMissing => e
  warn "missing source: #{e.extra_data[:source]}"
  exit 1
end

Prevention

Check File.exist? on the host before invoking upload
Use absolute source paths in CI to avoid cwd-dependent failures
Ensure the artifact-producing step runs before the upload step

When it happens

Trigger: A nonexistent or typo'd source path; a relative path evaluated from a different working directory; a glob or tilde the shell did not expand; on Windows, a mangled quoted path the one-character strip cannot fully repair.

Common situations: Uploading `./build/artifact.zip` before the build step produced it; CI launched from another cwd; unquoted paths containing spaces; case mismatches on case-sensitive filesystems.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of hashicorp/vagrant@35f3160f4a (2026-08-21). Data as JSON: /api/errors/00ed5113ee6c0132. Report an issue: GitHub.