Strapi v5: Relations not populating in API responses despite correct configuration

Question

Problem

I'm using Strapi v5 with SQLite database. My Wine content type has many-to-one relations to Category and Region, but these relations are never populated in API responses, regardless of the populate syntax used.

Environment

Strapi: v5
Database: SQLite
Node.js: v22.13.1

Schema Configuration

Wine schema:

{
    "category": {
        "type": "relation",
        "relation": "manyToOne",
        "target": "api::category.category",
        "inversedBy": "wines"
     },
     "region": {
          "type": "relation",
          "relation": "manyToOne",
          "target": "api::region.region",
          "inversedBy": "wines"
     }
}

Category and Region schemas are standard with oneToMany back-references.

What I've Verified

✅ Permissions: All roles have find/findOne enabled for Wine, Category, Region

✅ Database: Relations exist in wines_category_lnk and wines_region_lnk tables

✅ Admin UI: Relations display correctly in Content Manager

✅ Server restarts: Multiple times after schema changes

API Calls Tested

All return wines without relations:

GET /api/wines?populate=\*
GET /api/wines?populate\[category\]=*&populate\[region\]=*
GET /api/wines?populate\[category\]=true&populate\[region\]=true
GET /api/wines?populate\[0\]=category&populate\[1\]=region
GET /api/wines?populate=category,region

Sample response:

{
    "data": [
        {
            "id": 193,
            "name": "Château Margaux",
            "price": 850,
            "createdAt": "2025-09-15T08:06:26.672Z"
          // category and region fields completely missing
        }
    ]
}

Database Verification

Relations DO exist in database:

sqlite\> SELECT \* FROM wines_category_lnk WHERE wine_id = 193;
188|193|121|1.0

sqlite\> SELECT \* FROM wines_region_lnk WHERE wine_id = 193;
128|193|111|1.0

Workaround That Works

Using direct database queries in a custom controller:

export default factories.createCoreController('api::wine.wine', ({ strapi }) =\> ({
async find(ctx) {
const results = await strapi.db.query('api::wine.wine').findMany({
populate: {
category: true,
region: true,
},
});

      return { data: results, meta: { pagination: {...} } };
    },

}));

This returns wines with relations correctly populated.

Question

Why don't standard Strapi v5 API populate queries work, while direct strapi.db.query() calls do? Is this a known bug or am I missing something in the configuration?

Minilouze · Accepted Answer · 2025-09-15 09:34:20Z

0

SOLVED - The issue was caused by custom route configuration.

In src/api/wine/routes/wine.ts, I had a custom config that was disabling middlewares and policies:

export default factories.createCoreRouter('api::wine.wine', {
    config: {
        find: { auth: false, policies: \[\], middlewares: \[\] },
        findOne: { auth: false, policies: \[\], middlewares: \[\] },
    }
});

This configuration was preventing populate from working. By reverting to the default config:

export default factories.createCoreRouter('api::wine.wine');

The populate now works perfectly! Strapi's internal middlewares are required to properly process populate parameters.

Lesson learned: Be careful with custom route configurations as they can break Strapi's native functionalities like populate.

answered Sep 15 at 9:34

Minilouze

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Strapi v5: Relations not populating in API responses despite correct configuration

Problem

Environment

Schema Configuration

Wine schema:

What I've Verified

API Calls Tested

Database Verification

Workaround That Works

Question

1 Answer 1

Comments

Your Answer

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Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

Problem

Environment

Schema Configuration

Wine schema:

What I've Verified

API Calls Tested

Database Verification

Workaround That Works

Question

1 Answer 1

Comments

Your Answer

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