# MongoDB Atlas: Major incident: Intermittent 503 Errors on Atlas Admin API and Automation Tooling

**Summary:** MongoDB Atlas reported a major degradation: intermittent HTTP 503 errors affected Atlas Admin API and automation tooling such as Terraform; requests typically succeeded on retry, while database connectivity remained healthy. It lasted 39 h 50 min, from 2026-03-25 21:31 UTC to 2026-03-27 13:21 UTC. MongoDB identified the root cause and applied a fix, without specifying details. _(machine-written, sol)_
- Kind: Major incident · Label: degradation (model (Jev))
- Changed: 2026-03-25 21:31 UTC · Detected: 2026-10-17 18:22 UTC
- [Source: https://stspg.io/jzjbn35bsc7r](https://stspg.io/jzjbn35bsc7r)
- [Company: MongoDB Atlas](https://rewindex.com/company/mongodb-atlas.md)
- Versions: before (none: first archived) → after incident\_version:152/gch8hbs1yfz5@f0c2cc226701
- Change 1 of 1 for this incident

## What changed

**1. Added: Title**

```diff
+ Intermittent 503 Errors on Atlas Admin API and Automation Tooling
```

**2. Added: Impact**

```diff
+ major
```

**3. Added: Status**

```diff
+ resolved
```

**4. Added: Start time**

```diff
+ 2026-03-25 21:31 UTC
```

**5. Added: Resolved time**

```diff
+ 2026-03-27 13:21 UTC
```

**6. Added: Affected components**

```diff
+ MongoDB Cloud
```

**7. Added: Update** (investigating) · 2026-03-25 21:31 UTC

```diff
+ We are currently investigating intermittent spikes of HTTP 503 errors affecting Atlas control plane operations performed via the Atlas Admin API and automation tooling such as Terraform. Impacted requests typically fail for a short period and succeed on retry. Atlas database connectivity and data plane operations remain healthy. Our engineering teams are working to resolve the issue with high urgency and to prevent recurrence. Customers encountering 503 responses are advised to retry failed Admin API and Terraform operations with appropriate retry logic and backoff while we continue our investigation.
```

**8. Added: Update** (monitoring) · 2026-03-25 23:39 UTC

```diff
+ The team has identified the root cause of intermittent spikes of HTTP 503 errors and has applied a fix.
```

**9. Added: Update** (monitoring) · 2026-03-26 19:12 UTC

```diff
+ We continue to monitor our systems for intermittent spikes in 503 HTTP errors following our deployed fix. We will provide another update tomorrow by 3 PM UTC.
```

**10. Added: Update** (resolved) · 2026-03-27 13:21 UTC

```diff
+ We are no longer seeing intermittent spikes in HTTP 503 errors.
```

## History of this incident

| When (UTC) | Change | Label |
| --- | --- | --- |
| 2026-03-25 21:31 UTC | Major incident: Intermittent 503 Errors on Atlas Admin API and Automation Tooling (this change) | degradation |

All MongoDB Atlas changes: [timeline](https://rewindex.com/company/mongodb-atlas/changes.md)
_Diff excerpts are shown on normalized text: dates, counters and tokens appear as ‹date›, ‹count›, ‹tok›; noise-only edits are hidden. Rewindex shows the changed passages, not a copy of the page._


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Canonical: https://rewindex.com/change/ia3287b3e5c5b18 · Markdown: https://rewindex.com/change/ia3287b3e5c5b18.md · JSON: https://rewindex.com/api/v1/changes/ia3287b3e5c5b18 · Generated 2026-10-18T01:54:29.968Z