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Question

Bug in Loop from Text

  • January 20, 2026
  • 6 replies
  • 21 views

Hello guys!

We have found a bug in the Zapier Loop!

 

Context:

  • We have a query returning 3 columns and 16 rows
    • containing ids, names, list of topics
    • represented as separated with ‘|’ strings, e.g. `one|two|three`, in order to work with Loops
  • These 16 rows then was passed to the Zapier Loop from Text, attaching each column to a value
  • All worked as expected besides the following:
    • The ids and names columns all had values for all the rows
    • The list of topics however were empty for some rows, including the first 2 rows of the results
    • The Loop then SHIFTED UP the list of topics values by 2 rows to fill in the empty first 2 rows!
    • Example say we had as result of the query:
      • 1,bill, 
      • 2,john, 
      • 3,nick, a|b|c
      • 4,jack,
      • 5,dean,d|e
      • 6,george, 
    • The Loop got
      • 1,bill,a|b|c
      • 2,john, 
      • 3,nick,d|e
      • 4,jack, 
      • ...
    • The loop had no issue handling the empty list of topics rows AFTER filling in the first one with something (observation)

Impact:

  • Due to this issue we have send some wrong information to some recipients and had to do damage control

Temporary Workaround:

  • We don’t allow empty values now to ensure we have the correct information for our automations

Expectations:

  • We do expect the Zapier team to address this issue so we can remove the workaround at some point

 

Thanks for your time!

Bill

6 replies

Sparsh from Automation Jinn
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Hey ​@Bill M.,

For any feature request please contact the Zapier support here- https://zapier.com/app/get-help.

But the looping in Zapier do skip the empty values. For the time being, you can prevent the empty value entering the loop or replace it with some placeholder text depending on your use case. Hope it helps!


  • Author
  • New
  • January 21, 2026

Thanks ​@Sparsh from Automation Jinn 

However this isn’t/wasn’t mentioned in any Zapier Loop guides and it’s an important point, as mentioned above.

https://zapier.com/blog/looping-by-zapier-guide/

https://help.zapier.com/hc/en-us/articles/8496106701453-Loop-your-Zap-actions#h_01JB9H4PSVWADJ03KAP47PAA2J

Correct me if i’m wrong and it’s mentioned in any available guides.


SamB
Community Manager
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  • Community Manager
  • January 21, 2026

Hi ​@Bill M. 👋

Sorry to hear that the Zap sent out the wrong information! From what you’ve described it seems like this might have been caused by the number of Values to Loop values not being the same for each set (id, names, topics). If the values that were blank still had a comma to separate them then they should still be recognized and not skipped. 

For example, I just did a quick test with your example values manually typed in:

74cad7c58ef021154e3dd0c678a87f67.png
and that kept all the ids, names and topics together in the right order:

418ab3186455110f1cefcb24b7cca253.png
 

Can you share a quick screenshot of the action that’s supplying the values to the Looping action and a screenshot of the setup of Looping action? That’ll help us to see how it output those empty topic values to check whether the issue was down to a mismatch in the number of values or if it’s a bug with the Looping action itself. 

Looking forward to hearing from you!


  • Author
  • New
  • January 21, 2026

Hello ​@SamB 

There wasn’t a mismatch in the number of values in each set and I can’t share a screenshot due to sensitive data

Was able to reproduce as follows though:

Python code:

  • return {'ids': [1,2,3,4,5], 'names': ['bill', 'nick', 'john', 'jack', 'dean'], 'list_of_topics': ['','', "c", '',"e"]}

 


Troy Tessalone
Zapier Orchestrator & Solution Partner
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  • Zapier Orchestrator & Solution Partner
  • January 21, 2026

Hi ​@Bill M. 

If you are using arrays (as shown in the Python Code), then use this Zap action: Looping - Create Loop from Line Items

 

return {'ids': [1,2,3,4,5], 'names': ['bill', 'nick', 'john', 'jack', 'dean'], 'list_of_topics': ['','', "c", '',"e"]}


  • Author
  • New
  • January 21, 2026

Aha thanks ​@Troy Tessalone you are absolutely right!

 

I was certain I had tested that and went for Text instead, but now I can’t see any reason why not to use this!

Thanks again!