Issue Exporting Complete Incident Table Data to CSV Using URL Export

[BineshJ]

We are attempting to export the entire 'Incident' table to a CSV file using the URL export functionality in ServiceNow. However, we are encountering an issue where the export is silently truncated, and we only receive a partial dataset.

Details:

• Total number of records in the incident table: ~2.5 million
• Number of records received in the exported CSV: ~65,000
• Size of the exported CSV file: Approximately 435 MB
• We have set the Export Row Limit as 2.5 million

URL used for export:

https://<instance-id>.service-now.com/incident.do?CSV&sysparm_default_export_fields=all

There is no error message, just an incomplete export. We suspect this may be due to the size of the response payload.

Questions:

1. Is there a documented limit on the number of records or size for CSV exports using this method?
2. Are there recommended best practices for exporting large datasets (in the millions of records) from ServiceNow?

Any guidance or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you!

[Ankur Bawiskar]

@BineshJ 

it's a huge data.

Did you check the export settings?

Since you are exporting all fields it might be causing the issue.

why not use Export Set feature to export the table data?

If my response helped please mark it correct and close the thread so that it benefits future readers.

[Maik Skoddow]

Hi @BineshJ 

ServiceNow enforces a maximum row limit for CSV exports, regardless of what you set in the Export Row Limit property. The hard limit varies by instance and configuration, but exports may fail or truncate silently if the payload size is too large for the platform or browser to handle.

Increasing the export limit beyond what the platform can handle (e.g., 2.5 million) is not supported for out-of-the-box CSV export and can cause performance issues or incomplete exports. Therefore, stop your activities as they will never end in an export of over 2 million records! And you also risk breaking your instance due to running into an out-of-memory issue!

Instead break the export into smaller, manageable batches using filters (e.g., by month, priority, or sys_created_on) and then merge all exports into a single CSV file.

Or read the following article which explains more options I don't want to repeat here: https://www.perspectium.com/blog/how-to-quickly-export-all-data-in-a-table-in-servicenow/ 

Maik