Sheet Timeout & Performance Issues – Identical Copy Works Fine, Original Doesn’t

Hi everyone,

I’m currently working with a Smartsheet that includes:

~30 conditional formatting rules
~1700 rows
Multiple columns with INDEX/MATCH formulas
Numerous columns with regular @cell formulas
Numerous columns with various types of data
Two Data Shuttle workflows that update dropdown values in two columns
Multiple reports linked to the sheet
Extensive sharing permissions (many individuals and groups)

The issue I’m facing is that the sheet fails to save about 90% of the time, throwing a “Smartsheet timed out” error. It also struggles to load properly, and making any kind of change—whether it's updating data or modifying columns—is a major hassle.

Interestingly, I created a copy of the same sheet, and the copy performs exceptionally well. It saves instantly, loads smoothly, and handles changes without any lag. The copy has:

The same formulas
The same conditional formatting rules
The same number of rows

The only differences I can identify are the report links, sharing settings, and the fact that the original is actively used in workflows. However, I wouldn’t expect these factors alone to cause such a drastic performance drop.

Has anyone experienced something similar? Could report links, sharing settings, or Data Shuttle workflows be affecting performance more than expected? Any tips or insights would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks in advance!

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Sharing and Collaboration

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Conditional Formatting

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Paul Newcome

What about attachments? I ran into this before where I had a Data Shuttle creating an attachment on a regular basis. We ended up on version 30K something, but the new copy was on version 1 and worked flawlessly.

Abdullah.Noorzai

That's a great point—thanks for bringing it up. In this case, there are no Data Shuttle offload workflows directly attached to the target sheet. All offload workflows are configured to run and are attached to the source sheets, so the attachments and versioning behavior you're describing shouldn't apply here.

Paul Newcome

How many Data Shuttles do you have updating the sheet, and how frequently are they running?

Abdullah.Noorzai

I have 4 Data Shuttle workflows. They are all to update dropdowns. Three of them run every 15 minutes and one runs every 30 minutes.

Paul Newcome

I would suggest reaching out to Support at this point.

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