Unable to Download Terraform State File (UI + API Both Failing)

Infrastructure as Code & Cloud Native
1

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Problem: Unable to Download Terraform State File (UI + API Both Failing)

What we see in the UI

  • Under Operate → Terraform States → <stateName>, the state is visible.

  • However, there is no option to manually download the state file to validate its contents.

What we tried via API

We attempted to download the state using the Terraform State API:

curl --header "PRIVATE-TOKEN: $TF_STATE_TOKEN" \
"https://gitlab.com/api/v4/projects/<projectID>/terraform/state"

But we keep getting:

404 Not found (401 unauthorized sometimes with PAT)

Even though the state clearly exists in the project under Operate → Terraform States

Add the infrastructure-as-code or cloud-native configuration relevant to the question.

Infrastructure-as-Code

  • Terraform

Question

  • Is there a specific API endpoint or parameter required to download a Terraform state file?

  • Do Terraform states stored via the GitLab-managed backend support manual download?

  • Are there permissions or access-token scopes required beyond api?

Thanks for taking the time to be thorough in your request, it really helps! :blush: