SQLITE_CONSTRAINT_FOREIGNKEY
SQLiteERRORNotableConstraintofficial confidence
FOREIGN KEY constraint failed
Production Risk
Medium — referential integrity violation; INSERT/DELETE fails.
What this means
SQLITE_CONSTRAINT_FOREIGNKEY (787) is returned when a foreign key constraint is violated — either inserting a child row with no matching parent, or deleting a parent row that has existing children.
Why it happens
- 1INSERT into a child table with a foreign key value that does not exist in the parent table.
- 2DELETE from a parent table when child rows still reference it.
- 3Foreign key enforcement not enabled (PRAGMA foreign_keys = ON required).
How to reproduce
INSERT, UPDATE, or DELETE with foreign_keys enabled.
trigger — this will error
trigger — this will error
import sqlite3
conn = sqlite3.connect(':memory:')
conn.execute('PRAGMA foreign_keys = ON')
conn.execute('CREATE TABLE users(id INTEGER PRIMARY KEY)')
conn.execute('CREATE TABLE orders(user_id INTEGER REFERENCES users(id))')
try:
conn.execute('INSERT INTO orders VALUES(999)')
except sqlite3.IntegrityError as e:
print(e) # FOREIGN KEY constraint failedexpected output
sqlite3.IntegrityError: FOREIGN KEY constraint failed
Fix 1
Fix 2
Fix 3
What not to do
✕
Version notes
Sources
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