microsoft/graphrag · error · ValueError

max_retries must be greater than 1 for Immediate retry.

Error message

max_retries must be greater than 1 for Immediate retry.

What it means

RetryConfig validation requires max_retries > 1 for Immediate retry. Values of 1 or less are rejected even though the delay strategy is trivial.

Source

Thrown at packages/graphrag-llm/graphrag_llm/config/retry_config.py:60

    def _validate_exponential_backoff_config(self) -> None:
        """Validate Exponential Backoff retry configuration."""
        if self.max_retries is not None and self.max_retries <= 1:
            msg = "max_retries must be greater than 1 for Exponential Backoff retry."
            raise ValueError(msg)

        if self.base_delay is not None and self.base_delay <= 1.0:
            msg = "base_delay must be greater than 1.0 for Exponential Backoff retry."
            raise ValueError(msg)

        if self.max_delay is not None and self.max_delay <= 1:
            msg = "max_delay must be greater than 1 for Exponential Backoff retry."
            raise ValueError(msg)

    def _validate_immediate_config(self) -> None:
        """Validate Immediate retry configuration."""
        if self.max_retries is not None and self.max_retries <= 1:
            msg = "max_retries must be greater than 1 for Immediate retry."
            raise ValueError(msg)

    @model_validator(mode="after")
    def _validate_model(self):
        """Validate the retry configuration based on its type."""
        if self.type == RetryType.ExponentialBackoff:
            self._validate_exponential_backoff_config()
        elif self.type == RetryType.Immediate:
            self._validate_immediate_config()
        return self

View on GitHub (pinned to f40e9a26ce)

Solutions

1. Set max_retries to at least 2
2. If you want no retries, omit the retry config / set it to None rather than max_retries=0

Example fix

# before
RetryConfig(type="immediate", max_retries=1)
# after
RetryConfig(type="immediate", max_retries=2)

mr = retry_cfg.get("max_retries")
if retry_cfg.get("type") == "immediate" and mr is not None and mr <= 1:
    raise ValueError("max_retries must be > 1")

When it happens

Trigger: RetryConfig(type=RetryType.Immediate, max_retries=1) or 0/negative in settings.yaml.

Common situations: Trying to configure 'retry once' semantics; reducing retries during debugging and leaving max_retries=1 in the committed config.

Understand the failure class

Background: "Invalid value" and "allowed values are" config errors: what your library rejected and how to fix it — this error's family across 41 libraries.

Related errors

• max_retries must be greater than 1 for Exponential Backoff r
• base_delay must be greater than 1.0 for Exponential Backoff
• max_delay must be greater than 1 for Exponential Backoff ret
• RetryConfig.type '{strategy}' is not registered in the Retry
• api_base must be specified with the 'azure' model provider.

AI-assisted analysis of microsoft/graphrag@f40e9a26ce (2026-08-27). Data as JSON: /api/errors/7456c9db8881c2d4. Report an issue: GitHub.