Next.js Webhook Not Working? Common Causes and Fixes#

Scope: This guide focuses specifically on troubleshooting common webhook failures. For a comprehensive debugging guide, see How to Debug Webhook Failures in Next.js.

Setting up webhooks in Next.js usually works fine initially. You create an API route, test it locally, deploy to production, and everything appears functional. The real friction emerges over time: events that should trigger your handlers but don’t, retries that create duplicate processing, timeouts in serverless environments, and debugging sessions that involve digging through logs to understand what actually happened.

Most developers end up treating their webhook handlers as “working but fragile” — touching them as little as possible and hoping delivery issues resolve themselves. When nextjs webhook not working becomes a recurring problem, it’s usually less about handler logic and more about missing persistence and visibility between the provider and your app.

Why webhook deliveries fail silently in Next.js production#

The serverless execution model that makes Next.js deployment straightforward also creates several points where webhook processing can fail without clear indication:

Function timeouts during processing — Serverless functions have execution time limits. If your webhook handler needs to perform multiple operations, write to databases, or call external APIs, it may timeout before completing, returning an error to the provider while leaving your business logic in an inconsistent state.

Request parsing failures — Webhook payloads sometimes arrive malformed, with unexpected content types, or fail signature verification. The Next.js API route may throw an error that looks like a temporary failure to the provider, triggering retries when the issue is actually permanent.

Silent downstream failures — Your handler successfully receives and parses the webhook, but subsequent operations (database writes, API calls, queue processing) fail silently. The webhook provider receives a 200 response and considers delivery successful, while your application never completes the intended work.

Retry complexity without deduplication — When webhook providers retry failed deliveries, your Next.js app receives duplicate events without built-in mechanisms to detect or handle them. This often leads to duplicate processing or defensive coding that checks for existing records on every webhook.

Limited visibility into delivery attempts — Production debugging typically involves checking your application logs, but you can’t see failed delivery attempts that never reached your handler, or understand the retry patterns from the provider’s perspective.

If this is a low-volume app where occasional missed events are acceptable, this complexity may not matter yet.

Next.js serverless constraints and webhook reliability#

The serverless execution model creates specific challenges for webhook reliability. API routes run in isolated functions with limited execution time and no persistent state between requests. This means your handler can’t maintain context about previous delivery attempts or implement sophisticated retry logic without external storage.

Edge runtime environments have even stricter constraints around execution time and available APIs. What works in your local development environment may behave differently when deployed to serverless infrastructure with different timeout settings, memory limits, and network characteristics.

Framework abstractions also hide infrastructure concerns that become relevant at scale. Next.js handles request routing and response formatting, but doesn’t provide built-in solutions for webhook-specific needs like signature verification, duplicate detection, or failure replay.

How HookRelay reduces webhook debugging overhead#

HookRelay acts as a buffer between webhook providers and your Next.js application, handling delivery reliability concerns outside your application code. Instead of providers retrying your API routes directly, they deliver webhooks to HookRelay endpoints, which then forward events to your app while recording all delivery attempts.

This separation means webhook delivery reliability becomes an infrastructure concern rather than application logic. See how delivery failures are tracked for what “persistent delivery attempts” means in practice.

When your Next.js handler fails or times out, the failure is recorded with full request/response details, and the event remains available for inspection and replay. You can fix handler issues and replay failed events without rebuilding replay logic inside your application or asking providers to resend webhooks.

What this looks like in a Next.js app#

• Point webhook providers at HookRelay endpoints instead of your API routes
• HookRelay forwards events to your Next.js app and records all delivery attempts
• Failed deliveries remain inspectable with full request/response context
• Events can be replayed to your handler after fixing issues
• Retry logic and delivery persistence happen outside your serverless function

Stripe webhook debugging considerations#

Stripe webhooks add specific complexity around signature verification and retry behavior. Stripe expects webhook endpoints to respond within 20 seconds and uses exponential backoff for retries. If your Next.js handler takes too long or fails repeatedly, Stripe eventually disables the endpoint.

Signature verification failures are particularly tricky because they often indicate clock skew, incorrect secrets, or issues with how your Next.js API route processes the raw request body. These failures look temporary to debugging tools but are actually configuration issues.

Stripe’s retry behavior can also create confusion when debugging. A single failed event might generate multiple delivery attempts over several hours, making it unclear whether you’re seeing new failures or retries of previous ones.

When webhook reliability infrastructure makes sense#

This approach becomes useful once webhooks represent critical application functionality rather than nice-to-have features. If missed webhook events create customer-facing issues, require manual intervention, or represent lost revenue, the operational overhead of debugging delivery failures probably justifies infrastructure investment.

For early prototypes or applications where webhook events are purely supplemental, the additional complexity may not be worthwhile. The tradeoff depends on whether webhook reliability has become an operational concern for your team.

Moving webhook concerns outside application code#

Webhook reliability challenges in Next.js largely stem from mixing delivery concerns with business logic in serverless functions. Separating these concerns allows your handlers to focus on processing events while delivery, retry, and replay logic runs in dedicated infrastructure designed for these patterns.

View webhook delivery tracking to see how delivery attempts and failures are recorded outside your application.