Firestore Emulator: Invalid Record Exception when importing

[risalfajar]

[REQUIRED] Environment info

firebase-tools: 15.4.0

Platform: macOS

[REQUIRED] Test case

I will attach my emulators-cache:
emulators-cache.zip

[REQUIRED] Steps to reproduce

1. Initialize a Firebase project with Firestore emulator
2. Extract the zip above into the root of the project
3. Run emulators with --import=./emulators-cache
4. Crash

[REQUIRED] Expected behavior

It's not crash

[REQUIRED] Actual behavior

Feb 16, 2026 8:47:08 PM com.google.cloud.datastore.emulator.firestore.CloudFirestore main
SEVERE: Exiting due to unexpected exception.
com.google.cloud.datastore.core.exception.DatastoreException: Invalid record
	at com.google.cloud.datastore.util.leveldb.LevelDBLogReaderChannel.readPhysicalRecord(LevelDBLogReaderChannel.java:255)
	at com.google.cloud.datastore.util.leveldb.LevelDBLogReaderChannel.readRecord(LevelDBLogReaderChannel.java:93)
	at com.google.cloud.datastore.util.leveldb.LevelDBLogReaderChannel.readString(LevelDBLogReaderChannel.java:72)
	at com.google.cloud.datastore.util.leveldb.ExportImportUtil.parseOverallMetadataFile(ExportImportUtil.java:252)
	at com.google.cloud.datastore.util.leveldb.ExportImportUtil.fetchEntities(ExportImportUtil.java:81)
	at com.google.cloud.datastore.emulator.firestore.CloudFirestore.init(CloudFirestore.java:200)
	at com.google.cloud.datastore.emulator.firestore.CloudFirestore.startLocally(CloudFirestore.java:120)
	at com.google.cloud.datastore.emulator.firestore.CloudFirestore.main(CloudFirestore.java:101)

Exception in thread "main" java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: com/google/common/util/LegacySystemExit
	at com.google.cloud.datastore.emulator.firestore.CloudFirestore.main(CloudFirestore.java:106)
Caused by: java.lang.ClassNotFoundException: com.google.common.util.LegacySystemExit
	at java.base/jdk.internal.loader.BuiltinClassLoader.loadClass(BuiltinClassLoader.java:580)
	at java.base/java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:490)
	... 1 more

[aalej]

Hey @risalfajar, I tried to reproduce this issue, but on a fresh instance the emulator import/export feature is working as expected. Here are the steps I took:

1. Run firebase init firestore --project PROJECT_ID
2. Run firebase init emulators
   • Choose firestore and all defaults
3. Run firebase emulators:start --export-on-exit ./emulators-cache
4. Go to http://127.0.0.1:4000/firestore/default/data, and add test data

5. Stop the emulators Ctrl-C
6. Run firebase emulators:start --import ./emulators-cache
   • No errors raised

Although, when I tried to import the file you shared, the emulators raises an error during start up. Just to verify, are you also encountering the issue when creating a new instance or does it only occur when importing the specific file you shared?

If it's also occurring on a fresh instance, any chance you could provide more detailed steps like document and collection names added in firestore emulator?

I'm using the ff to reproduce the issue:

• node: v22.21.1
• java: openjdk 22.0.2
• platform: macOS
• firebase-tools: v15.4.0

[risalfajar]

This issue happened in two projects, and happened more than once, everytime it happens I redownload the data from the staging server back to the emulator. This happens very often.

The file I gave is from a new project, it only has one collection (users) with two document in it, just storing string, array, and date, nothing special.

[aalej]

At the moment, I still can't reproduce this issue. Tried doing this a couple of times but still no luck. I'm not sure why, but looking at the file you shared, it seems like exported data got corrupted somehow, could you let me know which java and node version you're using? Let's try to see if those could be affecting the export process.

[risalfajar]

Java:

openjdk 25.0.2 2026-01-20
OpenJDK Runtime Environment Homebrew (build 25.0.2)
OpenJDK 64-Bit Server VM Homebrew (build 25.0.2, mixed mode, sharing)

Node: v24.13.0