Why did my flag change not reach all users?

A flag change can miss some users for a few common reasons:

1. Caching / stale config

   • Clients, CDNs, SDKs, or your app may cache the previous flag value.
   • Some users may not have refreshed or re-fetched the latest configuration yet.

2. Targeting rules

   • The flag may be scoped to a segment, environment, region, or percentage rollout.
   • Some users simply don’t match the rule that was changed.

3. Propagation delay

   • In distributed systems, updates aren’t always instantaneous across all nodes/regions.
   • A subset of users may hit a server that still has the old value.

4. Client-side persistence

   • The app may persist the old flag locally until restart, logout/login, or a scheduled refresh.

5. Experiment / rollout assignment

   • If the flag is part of an experiment, user assignment may be sticky.
   • Changing the flag definition doesn’t always move already-assigned users.

6. Incorrect environment or audience

   • The change may have been made in staging instead of production, or for the wrong project/environment.

7. SDK / integration issues

   • Some app instances may be using an older SDK version, have network errors, or fail to initialize the flag system.

8. Offline / degraded connectivity

   • Users who were offline or had intermittent connectivity may not receive the update until later.

If you want, I can help you narrow it down by checking:

• what flag system you use,
• whether the change was a rollout vs. a direct value change,
• and whether affected users were on web, mobile, or backend.