[BUG] Cannot unpublish default locale using "Bulk Locale Based unpublishing" even when default locale is the only locale published

[Javimtib92]

Bug Description

When using the Plain Client API's bulkAction.unplublishV2 I'm geting the following error on the Bulk Action:

I am pretty sure I was sending all locales in the remove.fields['*'] but just to make sure, I tried to run it on entries with only en-001 locale as "published".

⚠️ I'm omitting space id and environment id from API calls

Given the following entry:

GET https://api.eu.contentful.com/spaces/{space_id}/environments/{environment_id}/entries/049676a2-963e-44cd-9220-3b91a39a528c

{
	"metadata": {
		"tags": [],
		"concepts": []
	},
	"sys": {
		// omitted other sys fields
		"fieldStatus": {
			"*": {
				"bg-BG": "draft",
				"cs-CZ": "draft",
				"da-DK": "draft",
				"de-AT": "draft",
				"de-BE": "draft",
				"de-CH": "draft",
				"de-DE": "draft",
				"el-GR": "draft",
				"en-009": "draft",
				"en-019": "draft",
				"en-142": "draft",
				"en-150": "draft",
				"en-AU": "draft",
				"en-CA": "draft",
				"en-GB": "draft",
				"en-HK": "draft",
				"en-IE": "draft",
				"en-IN": "draft",
				"en-001": "published",
				"es-ES": "draft",
				"es-MX": "draft",
				"fi-FI": "draft",
				"fr-BE": "draft",
				"fr-CA": "draft",
				"fr-CH": "draft",
				"fr-FR": "draft",
				"ga-IE": "draft",
				"hi-IN": "draft",
				"hu-HU": "draft",
				"it-CH": "draft",
				"it-IT": "draft",
				"ja-JP": "draft",
				"ko-KR": "draft",
				"nl-BE": "draft",
				"nl-NL": "draft",
				"no-NO": "draft",
				"pl-PL": "draft",
				"pt-BR": "draft",
				"pt-PT": "draft",
				"rm-CH": "draft",
				"ro-RO": "draft",
				"ru-RU": "draft",
				"sk-SK": "draft",
				"sv-FI": "draft",
				"sv-SE": "draft",
				"tr-TR": "draft",
				"uk-UA": "draft",
				"zh-CN": "draft",
				"zh-HK": "draft",
				"zh-TW": "draft",
				"en-US": "draft"
			}
		},
		"automationTags": [],
		"contentType": {
			"sys": {
				"type": "Link",
				"linkType": "ContentType",
				"id": "introSection"
			}
		}
	},
	"fields": {
                 // omitted the fields for simplicity
	}
}

I created the following bulk action:

POST https://api.eu.contentful.com/spaces/{space_id}/environments/{environment_id}/bulk_actions

Payload:

{
  "action": "publish",
  "entities": [
    {
      "entity": {
        "sys": {
          "id": "049676a2-963e-44cd-9220-3b91a39a528c",
          "type": "Link",
          "linkType": "Entry",
          "version": 8
        }
      },
      "remove": {
        "fields": {
          "*": [
              "en-001"
          ]
        }
      }
    }
  ]
}

Then I tried to fetch the created bulk action using

GET https://api.eu.contentful.com/spaces/{space_id}/environments/{environment_id}/bulk_actions/actions/51w1GjozutXWKmdKdzIHAj

But got an error saying I have to use BulkAction.v2 which is not mentioned in your documentation.

{
	"sys": {
		"type": "Error",
		"id": "ValidationFailed"
	},
	"message": "Validation error",
	"details": {
		"errors": [
			{
				"message": "Use new API to retrieve BulkAction.v2."
			}
		]
	}
}

Following the advice,I decided to inspect the library code to find the correct endpoint and I executed:

GET https://api.eu.contentful.com/spaces/{space_id}/environments/{environment_id}/bulk_actions/51w1GjozutXWKmdKdzIHAj

And got the following response:

{
	"sys": {
		"type": "BulkAction",
		"id": "51w1GjozutXWKmdKdzIHAj",
		"schemaVersion": "BulkAction.v2",
		"createdAt": "2025-12-17T10:44:04.701Z",
		"updatedAt": "2025-12-17T10:44:05.323Z",
		"startedAt": "2025-12-17T10:44:05.216Z",
		"completedAt": "2025-12-17T10:44:05.323Z",
		"status": "failed"
	},
	"action": "publish",
	"payload": {
		"action": "publish",
		"entities": [
			{
				"entity": {
					"sys": {
						"id": "049676a2-963e-44cd-9220-3b91a39a528c",
						"type": "Link",
						"linkType": "Entry",
						"version": 8
					}
				},
				"remove": {
					"fields": {
						"*": [
							"en-001"
						]
					}
				}
			}
		]
	},
	"error": {
		"sys": {
			"type": "Error",
			"id": "BulkActionFailed"
		},
		"message": "Failed to unpublish content",
		"details": {
			"errors": [
				{
					"entity": {
						"sys": {
							"type": "Link",
							"linkType": "Entry",
							"id": "049676a2-963e-44cd-9220-3b91a39a528c"
						}
					},
					"error": {
						"sys": {
							"type": "Error",
							"id": "ValidationFailed"
						},
						"message": "Validation error",
						"details": {
							"errors": [
								{
									"name": "Invalid payload",
									"details": "The default locale (en-001) cannot be unpublished"
								}
							]
						}
					}
				}
			]
		}
	}
}

Even though I'm not able to do it through the API, the Contentful Web App allows me to unpublish manually the en-001 locale.

I'm trying to automate unpublishing invalid entries on "x" locales and I encountered this issue.

Expected Behavior

Using bulk actions I should be able to unpublish en-001 locale if all locales are being unpublished, just like in the Contentful Web App

Actual Behavior

I'm not able to unpublish en-001 locale even if it's the only locale that is published.

[whitelisab]

Hi @Javimtib92, thanks for reporting this issue. It seems like this is in reference to our contentful-management JavaScript SDK (repo here), is that correct? If so, I can transfer this issue over to that repo instead. I am connecting with our team internally to see if this is expected behavior and I will report back!

[Javimtib92]

Hi @Javimtib92, thanks for reporting this issue. It seems like this is in reference to our contentful-management JavaScript SDK (repo here), is that correct? If so, I can transfer this issue over to that repo instead. I am connecting with our team internally to see if this is expected behavior and I will report back!

Yes, that's right. Sorry for miss-placing this issue.

[whitelisab]

No problem @Javimtib92! I just transferred the issue over to the correct repo.

Thank you for pointing out that the fetch endpoint is not listed in our documentation, I have notified the team to update the docs to include that endpoint.

In order to unpublish the default locale, you can use the whole entity unpublish. I was able to do so following the comment To perform the whole entity unpublish, just omit the 'remove' property in entity objects and use 'action': 'unpublish'. listed in this example

    const bulkAction = await plainClient.bulkAction.unpublishV2(
      {
        spaceId: <space_id>,
        environmentId: <env_id>,
      },
      {
        action: "unpublish",
        entities: [
          {
            entity: {
              sys: {
                type: "Link",
                linkType: "Entry",
                id: <entry_id>
              }
            }
          }
        ]
      }
    );

I hope that helps! If you have additional issues with this, I would encourage you to submit a support ticket and we can investigate further for you.

[Javimtib92]

@whitelisab unfortunately that does not work for us because what we want to do is to unpublish entries which are in an invalid state on "x" locale (we query them using a bulk validation). We are selectively choosing what locales to unpublish and as we have no fallback locale we expect to be able to unpublish the default locale if it is published on an invalid state.

[whitelisab]

@Javimtib92 Thanks for clarifying. At this point, I would encourage you to submit a support ticket with these details about your specific use case for locale-based bulk actions. Then we can get it routed to the appropriate team to follow up and provide some guidance for you. Thank you!