Troubleshoot lists

Managing lists in HubSpot organizes your records and can be used for marketing and sales efforts. You may encounter issues while creating, filtering, or editing your lists. This troubleshooting guide addresses common problems such as difficulties creating or deleting lists, unexpected records appearing in lists, discrepancies in list counts, and delays in processing. By following these solutions and best practices, you can resolve most list-related issues.

Unable to create a list

If you've reached the list limit in your account, you'll be unable to create additional lists. To create new lists, you can delete unused lists or discuss subscription options with your Customer Success Team or Manager. To delete unused lists, in the lists tool, navigate to the Unused lists tab to delete an individual list or delete lists in bulk. 

Unable to add a list filter

When building a list, the following limits apply:

• 250 filters per list. The limit applies to all filters, including if you're using AND and OR logic. For example, the list shown in the screenshot below has three filters.

• 60 associated object filters. For example, in a contact-based list, you can have up to 60 company property filters.

If you're building a list and try to add more than 250 filters or 60 associated object filters, you'll receive an error message.

Unable to delete a list

When a list can't be deleted, the Delete option will be grayed out. There are two reasons why you may be unable to delete a list:

• The list is used in a HubSpot tool; or
• the list is a default list.

To identify if the list is used in another HubSpot tool:

• In your HubSpot account, navigate to CRM > Lists.
• Hover over the list you want to delete and click Details.
• In the right panel, click the Used in tab. From this, you can determine your next actions based on the tools the list is used in:
  • If the list is used as a criteria in other lists, delete those lists or change their criteria to exclude this list.
  • If the list is used in workflows, delete the workflows or remove the list from their enrollment triggers.
  • If the list is used in saved views, delete the saved views or remove the list from its criteria.
  • If the list is used in audience access, remove the list from the page's access.
  • If the list is used in a report, edit the report to remove any reference to the list. 
• Delete the list.
• If the list still can't be deleted, it's likely a default list. These include persona lists, blog subscription lists, and partner lead registration lists if you're a HubSpot Partner.

List dashboard shows a different number of records in list

The size stated in the lists dashboard is an estimate of the number of records in the list. Click the list to view the actual count of records in the upper left. For newly created lists, the count of records shown in the list will be accurate once the list is saved and fully processed.

Unexpected records included in or missing from list

In active lists, records are included based on the filters you set. If there are unexpected records on the list, or if the list is missing expected records, verify that you have set your criteria correctly. For example, if you're trying to filter for specific values, verify that you're using the correct operator (e.g., contains any of vs. contains exactly vs. is equal to). Refer to this list of criteria options to understand their behavior.

Record not appearing in list after property update

If you've recently updated a record's property values, the record should be added to an active list immediately following the update. For complex lists or bulk property updates, this refresh may require up to one hour.

Unexpected contacts in list based on activity filters

The Email filter in lists evaluates contacts based on all historical email activity (e.g., clicks) for all email addresses ever associated with a contact. If you've changed the email address of a contact, interactions from their previous email address will still count towards list filters. In this case, an unexpected contact may be included in a list with activity filters because of activity associated with previous email addresses.

List taking a long time to process

Most lists will finish processing within a few minutes, but complex lists may take longer to process. Lists with complex filters, such as those related to integrations, page views, or list memberships, can take up to two hours to process.

You can set up notifications to receive an alert when a list has finished processing.