What causes "Method 'clearExpiredExecutions' not implemented." in medusajs/medusa?

Implement clearExpiredExecutions in your adapter (delete executions past their expiration from your store)

medusajs/medusa · error · Error

Method 'clearExpiredExecutions' not implemented.

Error message

Method 'clearExpiredExecutions' not implemented.

What it means

clearExpiredExecutions is a maintenance hook the workflow engine can call to purge expired workflow executions from storage. Like the other optional members of AbstractTransactionStore, the default implementation throws to indicate the adapter does not support cleanup.

Source

Thrown at packages/core/orchestration/src/transaction/datastore/abstract-storage.ts:150

  async scheduleStepTimeout(
    transaction: DistributedTransactionType,
    step: TransactionStep,
    timestamp: number,
    interval: number
  ): Promise<void> {
    throw new Error("Method 'scheduleStepTimeout' not implemented.")
  }

  async clearStepTimeout(
    transaction: DistributedTransactionType,
    step: TransactionStep
  ): Promise<void> {
    throw new Error("Method 'clearStepTimeout' not implemented.")
  }

  async clearExpiredExecutions(): Promise<void> {
    throw new Error("Method 'clearExpiredExecutions' not implemented.")
  }
}

View on GitHub (pinned to 5e06e544a2)

Solutions

Implement clearExpiredExecutions in your adapter (delete executions past their expiration from your store)
If cleanup is handled externally (TTL policies, cron SQL), implement it as a no-op instead of leaving the throwing stub
Use the built-in Redis storage which implements expiry via key TTL

Example fix

// before
async clearExpiredExecutions() {
  throw new Error("not implemented")
}

// after
async clearExpiredExecutions() {
  await this.dataSource.query(
    `DELETE FROM workflow_execution WHERE expired_at < now()`
  )
}

Defensive patterns

Strategy: validation

Validate before calling

if (storage.clearExpiredExecutions === AbstractTransactionStore.prototype.clearExpiredExecutions) {
  // disable scheduled cleanup or implement it
  console.warn('Execution cleanup unsupported; skipping schedule')
}

Prevention

Decide retention strategy up front: adapter-level cleanup, external cron, or TTL — and implement clearExpiredExecutions accordingly

When it happens

Trigger: The workflow engine (or an explicit cleanup schedule) invokes clearExpiredExecutions on the configured storage, and the custom storage adapter did not override it — typically when workflows run with expiration configured or when a scheduled cleanup runs.

Common situations: Custom storage adapters written against an older API; enabling workflow retention/cleanup features on an adapter that never implemented them; upgrading to a Medusa version that periodically calls cleanup.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of medusajs/medusa@5e06e544a2 (2026-08-27). Data as JSON: /api/errors/6ce60f2750435974. Report an issue: GitHub.