'Failed to load leads' almost always means your filter combination timed out the search query. The most common trigger is broad AI-suggested keywords combined with verified-only and decision-makers. Narrow your filters and retry.

"Failed to load leads" — what it means and how to fix it

If you've searched and seen "Failed to load leads", "no matter what I input I get failed to load", "tried to load for 10–15 minutes then failed", or "no leads found, clear the filters" — this article is for you.

What the error means

The toast appears when the search API returns an error. Three things cause it:

Your query timed out at the database — by far the most common cause. The server returns the message "Search query timed out. Try fewer filters." but the UI shortens it to "Failed to load leads".
You hit a per-minute rate limit (30 searches/min on Free, 120/min on Pro). Wait 60 seconds.
You're not signed in or your session expired — the API returns 401. Reload the page and sign in again.

Filter combinations that commonly time out

Based on real support tickets, these patterns trigger timeouts most often:

Broad keywords + Verified Only + Decision Makers + small employee range — the database has to scan and join across many indexes. AI-suggested keyword sets are particularly expensive when they expand to 10+ OR clauses.
A keyword like "pressure washing" or "restoration" with no location filter — narrow industries spread thinly across the whole world take longer to scan than the same keyword scoped to a country or state.
Multiple AI-generated keyword expansions stacked together — pick the 2–3 best, not all of them.

How to recover

Try these in order:

Add a location (country at minimum) — this prunes the search space dramatically.
Trim keywords to the 2–3 most specific terms.
Drop "Verified Only" temporarily to confirm the rest of the query works, then re-enable it.
Drop "Decision Makers" temporarily — it ANDs many job-title filters.
Narrow employee range (e.g., 11–50 instead of 1–10000).
Reload the page and sign in again if you suspect a session issue.

If the search succeeds with fewer filters, add them back one at a time to find the breaking combination.

"No leads found — clear the filters"

This is a different message and means the search succeeded but returned zero rows. The fix is what the message says: clear or loosen filters. The most common cause is a too-narrow combination (e.g., "CMO at a 1–10-person SaaS in Tuvalu").

When it's not a filter problem

If you've narrowed filters and still see the error consistently:

Check the green/red status dot at [/admin/health](/admin/health) if you have admin access — the underlying lead database may be temporarily down.
Try a totally different database (B2B → Local Leads or Creator Leads) — if those work, the issue is scoped to one source.
Sign out and back in to refresh your session token.
Submit a ticket with: the exact filter set you tried, the time you tried it, and a screenshot of the error if the toast had any extra text.

Failed to load leads — fix and what causes it