langflow-ai/langflow · error · HTTPException

Starter project and default project not found. Please create

Error message

Starter project and default project not found. Please create a project and add flows to it.

What it means

404 from GET /api/v1/flows/ (the list endpoint): neither the 'Starter' folder (STARTER_FOLDER_NAME) nor the default folder (DEFAULT_FOLDER_NAME) exists in the database. The listing is folder-anchored — it needs at least one of these seed folders to scope the query — so an installation whose initial-setup folder seeding never ran (or was deleted) cannot list flows at all.

Source

Thrown at src/backend/base/langflow/api/v1/flows.py:157

    components_only: bool = False,
    get_all: bool = True,
    folder_id: UUID | None = None,
    flow_type: FlowType | None = None,
    params: Annotated[Params, Depends()],
    header_flows: bool = False,
):
    """Retrieve a list of flows with optional pagination, filtering, and header-only mode."""
    try:
        auth_settings = get_settings_service().auth_settings

        default_folder = (await session.exec(select(Folder).where(Folder.name == DEFAULT_FOLDER_NAME))).first()
        default_folder_id = default_folder.id if default_folder else None

        starter_folder = (await session.exec(select(Folder).where(Folder.name == STARTER_FOLDER_NAME))).first()
        starter_folder_id = starter_folder.id if starter_folder else None

        if not starter_folder and not default_folder:
            raise HTTPException(
                status_code=404,
                detail="Starter project and default project not found. Please create a project and add flows to it.",
            )

        if not folder_id:
            folder_id = default_folder_id

        # Rows the caller owns outright. Under AUTO_LOGIN the legacy owner-scoped
        # query also surfaces null-owner flows; keep that in the fallback path
        # (``fallback_clause``). The SQL prefilter union, however, must NOT
        # blanket-include null-owner rows: the in-memory fallback routes them
        # through ``batch_enforce`` (``filter_visible_resources``'s owner_extractor
        # returns None, which never equals a real user id), so the prefilter keeps
        # them out of the owned half and a null-owner flow is visible only when the
        # plugin lists its id. AUTHZ_ENABLED and AUTO_LOGIN are independent flags,
        # so both can be set — this keeps the two paths consistent regardless.
        owned_clause = Flow.user_id == current_user.id
        fallback_clause = owned_clause

View on GitHub (pinned to 976ec789d2)

Solutions

1. Let Langflow run its initial setup against this database (start the server so it seeds the default folder) and retry
2. Or create the folders via the API/UI so at least the default folder exists, then add flows
3. If folders were deleted accidentally, restore from a DB backup

Example fix

-- before: no default folder rows
SELECT name FROM folder; -- neither 'Starter' nor the default name

-- after: re-seed the default folder (name must match DEFAULT_FOLDER_NAME)
INSERT INTO folder (id, name, user_id) VALUES (gen_random_uuid(), '<DEFAULT_FOLDER_NAME>', NULL);

const { data: folders } = await axios.get('/api/v1/folders/');
const seeded = folders.some((f) => f.name === DEFAULT_FOLDER_NAME || f.name === STARTER_FOLDER_NAME);

catch (e) {
  if (e.response?.status === 404 && /Starter project and default project/.test(e.response.data?.detail))
    showSetupPrompt();
  throw e;
}

When it happens

Trigger: Calling the flows listing on a fresh/custom database where initial setup did not create the seed folders, after someone deleted both folders and their flows, or against a database initialized by an external tool that skipped langflow's initial_setup.

Common situations: Pointing LANGFLOW_DATABASE_URL at a manually-created schema; running with a DB restored without the seed rows; setups that deliberately strip example content but also removed the folders.

Related errors

• Flow not found.
• Flow not found
• Folder not found
• Failed to load file (HTTP ${status})
• reload-in-progress

AI-assisted analysis of langflow-ai/langflow@976ec789d2 (2026-08-14). Data as JSON: /api/errors/33effd4ee5c43722. Report an issue: GitHub.