Intermediate 30 min read

The Database Class and Partial Success

By the end of this lesson, you'll be able to:

Use Database.insert with allOrNone set to false
Check each result for success or failure without the whole operation throwing
Explain when partial success is preferable to the default all-or-nothing behavior

Prerequisites: "Merge"

The default: all-or-nothing

List<Account> accounts = new List<Account>{
    new Account(Name = 'Valid Account'),
    new Account() // missing required Name — invalid
};

insert accounts; // throws a DmlException — NEITHER record gets saved

Plain insert on a List is all-or-nothing by default: if even one record in the batch fails validation, the entire batch is rolled back — even the perfectly valid Account never gets saved.

Database.insert with partial success

List<Account> accounts = new List<Account>{
    new Account(Name = 'Valid Account'),
    new Account() // still invalid
};

List<Database.SaveResult> results = Database.insert(accounts, false);

for (Database.SaveResult result : results) {
    if (result.isSuccess()) {
        System.debug('Saved: ' + result.getId());
    } else {
        System.debug('Failed: ' + result.getErrors()[0].getMessage());
    }
}

Database.insert(accounts, false) — the false means "don't require all-or-nothing" — saves the valid Account and reports the failure for the invalid one, instead of losing both. results is a List<Database.SaveResult>, one entry per input record, in the same order, each reporting success or failure individually.

When to choose partial success

Partial success fits a batch import where a handful of bad rows shouldn't block the hundreds of good ones — process what's valid, and report the failures for someone to fix separately. All-or-nothing (the default, and Database.insert(accounts, true) explicitly) fits situations where related records must succeed together or not at all — like inserting an Opportunity alongside its required related records in one atomic operation.

Exercise

Given List<Account> accounts (some possibly invalid), use Database.insert with partial success, and debug how many succeeded vs failed.

Show hint

Loop over the results, counting isSuccess() true/false.

APEX

The Database Class and Partial Success Quiz

1. What does Database.insert(accounts, false) allow that plain insert accounts does not?

Valid records to save even if other records in the same batch fail Inserting records without a Name field Bypassing all validation rules Inserting more than 200 records at once

My Notes

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Summary

The plain insert/update/delete statements are all-or-nothing — one bad record fails the entire batch. Database.insert (and its siblings) can allow partial success instead, processing every valid record even if some fail.

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