The depth limit

• Formulas in Notion have a depth limit of 15 for performance reasons!
• Every time a formula references another formula or rollup, the depth of a formula increases by 1! This includes formulas in different databases
• When you hit this limit, you’ll see an error in the UI that indicates you’ve hit the depth limit.
  • This limit includes the limit of recursively called formulas too (see [Formulas 2.0] Advanced relation traversal & recursion for more info).

In the example below, Formula calls Formula (1), Formula (1) calls Formula (2) and so on, until Formula (16) returns true.

Example

Above, you’ll see that Formula references 15 formulas in total deep, so it throws an error.

Formula (1) references 14 formulas in total deep, so it does not throw an error.

Generally, the resolution for this is to consolidate extraneous formulas & rollups into fewer properties. You do not need to use both formulas and rollups anymore in 2.0 — you can construct everything you need in a formula.

Note: in the past, prior to August 2024, this depth limit was 7 and did not throw an error visibly in the UI!