quarkusio/quarkus · critical · IllegalStateException

Quarkus failed to start up

Error message

Quarkus failed to start up

What it means

Thrown by Quarkus.manualStart() as an IllegalStateException when the manual state machine is in MANUAL_FAILURE, meaning a prior bootstrap/initialization step failed so startup cannot proceed. A RuntimeException variant with the bootstrap-failed message is also possible under race conditions inside the lock.

Solutions

1. Ensure manualInitialize() completes successfully before calling manualStart().
2. Inspect and fix the exception thrown by the earlier manualInitialize() call.
3. Treat MANUAL_FAILURE as terminal: redeploy/recreate the runtime instead of retrying.

Example fix

// before
Quarkus.manualInitialize(); // exception swallowed upstream
Quarkus.manualStart();
// after
Quarkus.manualInitialize(); // let failures propagate
Quarkus.manualStart(); // only reached on success

// ensure init ran successfully before start:
Objects.requireNonNull(initResult, "manualInitialize must complete first");

try { Quarkus.manualInitialize(); Quarkus.manualStart(); } catch (RuntimeException e) { log.error("manual lifecycle failed", e); throw e; }

When it happens

Trigger: Calling Quarkus.manualStart() after manualInitialize() (or an earlier manualStart()) failed and set manualState to MANUAL_FAILURE.

Common situations: Serverless handler code that ignores the exception from manualInitialize() and still calls manualStart() on the next invocation; framework glue code invoking start without checking init success.

Related errors

• Quarkus initialization error
• Quarkus manual start cannot proceed as warmup did not run
• The application has not been started
• All parameters have already been loaded, it is too late to…
• Cannot reset a started application

AI-assisted analysis of quarkusio/quarkus@e1c734241f (2026-09-05). Data as JSON: /api/errors/7221a9bb575cd394. Report an issue: GitHub.

Appendix: source

Thrown at core/runtime/src/main/java/io/quarkus/runtime/Quarkus.java:301

        } catch (Exception e) {
            manualState = MANUAL_FAILURE;
            throw new RuntimeException("Quarkus manual initialization failed", e);
        }
    }

    /**
     * Manual startup of Quarkus runtime in cases where
     * Quarkus does not have control over main() i.e. Lambda or Azure Functions.
     *
     * This method will call Application.start() and register shutdown hook
     * It will fail if Quarkus.manualInitialize() has not been called.
     *
     *
     */
    public static void manualStart() {
        int tmpState = manualState;
        if (tmpState == MANUAL_FAILURE)
            throw new IllegalStateException("Quarkus failed to start up");
        if (tmpState >= MANUAL_STARTING)
            return;
        synchronized (manualLock) {
            tmpState = manualState;
            if (tmpState == MANUAL_FAILURE)
                throw new RuntimeException("Quarkus manual bootstrap failed");
            if (tmpState >= MANUAL_STARTING)
                return;
            if (tmpState != MANUAL_INITIALIZED)
                throw new IllegalStateException("Quarkus manual start cannot proceed as warmup did not run");
            manualState = MANUAL_STARTING;
        }
        try {
            String[] args = {};
            Runtime.getRuntime().addShutdownHook(new Thread() {
                @Override
                public void run() {
                    ShutdownRecorder.runShutdown();

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