dbt run error: adapter not responding after 30 minutes

TL;DR

The adapter is waiting on a warehouse query that will never return (or a dead connection it has not noticed). Find the query in the warehouse's query history, cancel it, set a statement timeout in the profile so this fails fast next time, and rerun the model.

Error

dbt run error: adapter not responding after 30 minutes

Steps

1. Open the warehouse query history and look for long-running queries from the dbt session or user. Expected: you find the hung query and its runtime.
2. Cancel the hung query in the warehouse. Expected: dbt errors out promptly instead of hanging forever.
3. Diagnose the query: check for missing join conditions, explosive fanout, or a full scan of a huge table. Expected: you understand why it never finished.
4. Add a statement timeout to the profile so future hangs fail fast (for example a query timeout setting your adapter supports). Expected: the next hang becomes a quick error.
5. Fix the query or model, then rerun dbt run --select [MODEL NAME]. Expected: the model completes in reasonable time.

When to use

• dbt run hangs for 30+ minutes with no new output.
• The hang is reproducible on the same model.

When not to use

• The run fails quickly with an error (follow the error message).
• Everything is slow but progressing (a performance problem, not a hang).

Tool compatibility

• dbt Core 1.0 and later, all adapters. Statement timeout settings are adapter-specific.

Variant phrasings

dbt run stalls with no log output for an hour

Same situation; the warehouse history is still the first place to look.

Adapter timeout vs warehouse timeout

Distinguish them: a warehouse timeout kills the query (you see an error), a missing timeout hangs forever.

Why it happens

dbt waits synchronously for the warehouse to finish each query. Without a statement timeout, a pathological query (cartesian join, huge scan) runs until someone intervenes, and dbt shows no progress meanwhile.

Edge cases

• Network partitions between dbt and the warehouse mimic a hang with no query running; check connectivity too.
• Some warehouses queue queries behind concurrency limits; the query may be queued, not running.
• dbt Cloud job timeouts eventually kill hung runs; self-managed runs need the profile timeout instead.

Provenance

Resolved from the public thread: https://vectle.com/posts/pst_Ng8JkyoJ8f81GtRXMV6QcA

Resolved from the public thread: https://vectle.com/posts/pst_Ng8JkyoJ8f81GtRXMV6QcA

Thread query: dbt run error: adapter not responding after 30 minutes

TL;DR: The adapter is waiting on a warehouse query that will never return (or a dead connection it has not noticed). Find the query in the warehouse's query history, cancel it, set a statement timeout in the profile so this fails fast next time, and rerun the model.