# Detecting business errors by listing for workflows with high retry attempts

**URL:** <https://community.temporal.io/t/detecting-business-errors-by-listing-for-workflows-with-high-retry-attempts/6942>\
**Category:** Community Support\
**Created:** [January 16, 2023, 8:50am UTC](https://community.temporal.io/t/detecting-business-errors-by-listing-for-workflows-with-high-retry-attempts/6942 "2023-01-16T08:50:51Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Zhiwei\_Chong](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/community.temporal.io/zhiwei_chong/32/3168_2.png) [@Zhiwei\_Chong](https://community.temporal.io/u/Zhiwei_Chong)\
**Post date:** [January 16, 2023, 8:50am UTC](https://community.temporal.io/t/detecting-business-errors-by-listing-for-workflows-with-high-retry-attempts/6942/1 "2023-01-16T08:50:51Z")

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Hi,

I want to be alerted when there is a workflow with activities that have retried for more than N attempts, so I can investigate if it is a bug in our business logic.

Is there a quick way to list such workflows?

If not, what is the recommended way for such scenarios?

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**Author:** ![mrsaints](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/community.temporal.io/mrsaints/32/118_2.png) [@mrsaints](https://community.temporal.io/u/mrsaints)\
**Post date:** [January 16, 2023, 3:19pm UTC](https://community.temporal.io/t/detecting-business-errors-by-listing-for-workflows-with-high-retry-attempts/6942/2 "2023-01-16T15:19:58Z")

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Would be curious to know how others do it too.

We’ve been using metrics on error logs to monitor. But, am aware there are now interceptors in Go SDK for activity errors, see [Workflow / activity middleware](https://community.temporal.io/t/workflow-activity-middleware/1142)

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**Author:** ![tihomir](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/community.temporal.io/tihomir/32/6580_2.png) [@tihomir](https://community.temporal.io/u/tihomir)\
**Post date:** [February 9, 2026, 11:33pm UTC](https://community.temporal.io/t/detecting-business-errors-by-listing-for-workflows-with-high-retry-attempts/6942/3 "2026-02-09T23:33:20Z")

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Best way still is to push custom metric from activity code (or activity interceptor) when  
attempt count \> N