event grid topic subscriptions stuck in Deleting state

Question

event grid topic subscriptions stuck in Deleting state

Brian Dunnington 6 Microsoft Employee Admin

i am a Microsoft employee working on the Microsoft Learn website. yesterday afternoon, we tried to do a regular deployment using EV2 and ARM. when our ARM templates tried to update our existing Event Grid Topic Subscriptions, they timed out and the resources were stuck in a ProvisioningState of 'Updating'. they stayed that way overnight and additional attempts to deploy via ARM resulted in Conflict errors saying '409 unable to update while resource is provisioning'. finally in desparation, i tried deleting the entire Event Grid System Topic via the portal. the portal indicated success and the resource was no longer visible. so i then tried to create a new Event Grid System Topic with the same name, but it appears to simply have resurrected the same stuck instance - the Event Grid Topic Subscription was already there (even though i just recreated the parent resource) and now stuck in a Deleting state. we are now unable to (fully) delete the resource nor update it, so we cannot proceed with our deployment.

feel free to reach out to me directly on Teams if you prefer

Pravallika KV 12,315 Reputation points Microsoft External Staff Moderator

2026-01-12T01:02:30.59+00:00
Hi @Brian Dunnington ,

Thanks for reaching out to Microsoft Q&A.

Below are the steps you can try to resolve the issue:

Check Resource Status: Ensure that no other operations are currently being performed on the Event Grid Topic. Sometimes, resources can get stuck if there are overlapping deployments.

Use Azure CLI or PowerShell: You might need to force the deletion of the stuck subscriptions or the Event Grid Topic using Azure CLI or PowerShell commands. Here are the commands you can try:

Azure CLI: To delete an event subscription:
az eventgrid system-topic event-subscription delete --name YOUR_EVENT_SUBSCRIPTION_NAME --resource-group YOUR_RESOURCE_GROUP_NAME --system-topic-name YOUR_SYSTEM_TOPIC_NAME
To delete the system topic:
az eventgrid system-topic delete --name YOUR_SYSTEM_TOPIC_NAME --resource-group YOUR_RESOURCE_GROUP_NAME

Azure PowerShell: To delete an event subscription:
Remove-AzEventGridSystemTopicEventSubscription -EventSubscriptionName YOUR_EVENT_SUBSCRIPTION_NAME -ResourceGroupName YOUR_RESOURCE_GROUP_NAME -SystemTopicName YOUR_SYSTEM_TOPIC_NAME
To delete the system topic:
Remove-AzEventGridSystemTopic -ResourceGroupName YOUR_RESOURCE_GROUP_NAME -Name YOUR_SYSTEM_TOPIC_NAME

Wait for Completion: If you triggered the deletion command, wait for a couple of minutes and check the status again. Sometimes operations take longer than expected.

Consult Diagnostic Logs: For deeper insights, you can enable and view diagnostic logs for your Event Grid topics to identify what might be causing the blockage. How to enable and view Diagnostic logs for Event Grid topics.

Relevant Documentation:

Manage topics and publish events using event domains

Problems removing subscriptions

Common errors with recommended solutions for Event Grid
NecroPhallus 5 Reputation points

2026-01-12T15:07:24.3966667+00:00

Hey, I have the same problem. What I also noticed that when I delete event grid topic and restore it via pipeline run it recreates the subscription in the same state as before - in delete state. Given this I am completely stuck with it because I cannot remove subscription and parent resource(topic) deletion also does not help. Is there any walk-around with this problem?
Brian Dunnington 6 Reputation points Microsoft Employee Admin

2026-01-12T18:39:06.9866667+00:00

@Pravallika KV thanks, but these steps do not work. like @NecroPhallus mentioned, even if i delete the entire Event Grid System Topic (using the Powershell commands you shared or via the Portal), when i recreate the System Topic, it is restored in the same broken state with the topic subscriptions also restored.

Answer recommended by moderator

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Your answer

Pravallika KV 12,315 Reputation points Microsoft External Staff Moderator

2026-01-12T01:02:30.59+00:00

Hi @Brian Dunnington ,

Thanks for reaching out to Microsoft Q&A.

Below are the steps you can try to resolve the issue:

Check Resource Status: Ensure that no other operations are currently being performed on the Event Grid Topic. Sometimes, resources can get stuck if there are overlapping deployments.

Use Azure CLI or PowerShell: You might need to force the deletion of the stuck subscriptions or the Event Grid Topic using Azure CLI or PowerShell commands. Here are the commands you can try:

Azure CLI: To delete an event subscription:
az eventgrid system-topic event-subscription delete --name YOUR_EVENT_SUBSCRIPTION_NAME --resource-group YOUR_RESOURCE_GROUP_NAME --system-topic-name YOUR_SYSTEM_TOPIC_NAME
To delete the system topic:
az eventgrid system-topic delete --name YOUR_SYSTEM_TOPIC_NAME --resource-group YOUR_RESOURCE_GROUP_NAME

Azure PowerShell: To delete an event subscription:
Remove-AzEventGridSystemTopicEventSubscription -EventSubscriptionName YOUR_EVENT_SUBSCRIPTION_NAME -ResourceGroupName YOUR_RESOURCE_GROUP_NAME -SystemTopicName YOUR_SYSTEM_TOPIC_NAME
To delete the system topic:
Remove-AzEventGridSystemTopic -ResourceGroupName YOUR_RESOURCE_GROUP_NAME -Name YOUR_SYSTEM_TOPIC_NAME

Wait for Completion: If you triggered the deletion command, wait for a couple of minutes and check the status again. Sometimes operations take longer than expected.

Consult Diagnostic Logs: For deeper insights, you can enable and view diagnostic logs for your Event Grid topics to identify what might be causing the blockage. How to enable and view Diagnostic logs for Event Grid topics.

Relevant Documentation:

Manage topics and publish events using event domains

Problems removing subscriptions

Common errors with recommended solutions for Event Grid
NecroPhallus 5 Reputation points

2026-01-12T15:07:24.3966667+00:00

Hey, I have the same problem. What I also noticed that when I delete event grid topic and restore it via pipeline run it recreates the subscription in the same state as before - in delete state. Given this I am completely stuck with it because I cannot remove subscription and parent resource(topic) deletion also does not help. Is there any walk-around with this problem?
Brian Dunnington 6 Reputation points Microsoft Employee Admin

2026-01-12T18:39:06.9866667+00:00

@Pravallika KV thanks, but these steps do not work. like @NecroPhallus mentioned, even if i delete the entire Event Grid System Topic (using the Powershell commands you shared or via the Portal), when i recreate the System Topic, it is restored in the same broken state with the topic subscriptions also restored.

Answer 1

Brian Dunnington 6 Microsoft Employee Admin

The Azure Event Grid team fixed this - I dont know what they did, but I confirmed that my 'Deleting' subscriptions were actually removed and then I was able to recreate them properly without issue.

Daren.Sell 15 Reputation points

2026-01-28T21:50:51.3433333+00:00

Appears to still be happening for us. Haven't had this issue until this month.

Answer 2

It seems you are experiencing issues with Event Grid Topic Subscriptions being stuck in a Deleting state after a failed update attempt. Here are some steps you can consider to troubleshoot and resolve the issue:

Wait for Provisioning State: Sometimes, resources can take longer than expected to update or delete. If the resource is still in a provisioning state, give it some more time before trying to take further action.
Check for Dependencies: Ensure that there are no dependencies or other resources that might be preventing the deletion of the Event Grid Topic Subscription. Sometimes, linked resources can cause conflicts.

Use Azure CLI or PowerShell: If the portal is not reflecting the changes accurately, try using Azure CLI or PowerShell commands to force delete the subscription. You can use the following commands:

Azure CLI:

     az eventgrid event-subscription delete --name <event-subscription-name> --source-resource-id "/subscriptions/<sub-id>/resourceGroups/<my-resource-group>/providers/Microsoft.EventGrid/domains/<my-domain-name>/topics/<my-topic>"

PowerShell:

     Remove-AzEventGridSubscription -ResourceId "/subscriptions/<sub-id>/resourceGroups/<my-resource-group>/providers/Microsoft.EventGrid/domains/<my-domain-name>/topics/<my-topic>" -EventSubscriptionName <event-subscription-name>

Check Azure Status Dashboard: Sometimes, issues can be related to Azure service outages. Check the Azure status dashboard to see if there are any ongoing issues with Event Grid in your region.
Contact Support: If the issue persists, consider reaching out to Microsoft support for assistance, especially since you are a Microsoft employee. They may have additional tools and insights to help resolve the stuck resources.

These steps should help you troubleshoot the issue with the Event Grid Topic Subscriptions stuck in a Deleting state.

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event grid topic subscriptions stuck in Deleting state

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