spring.config.import: configserver belongs in profile files, not application.yml

2026-03-03 (7m ago)7 views

I was setting up a Spring Boot 3.x app to run locally while the same app uses Spring Cloud Config in dev/stg/prod. My application.yml had:

spring:
  application:
    name: myapp
  config:
    import: "optional:configserver:http://config.dev.example.com/configserver/config"

The problem: even with optional:, when the config server is reachable (e.g. you're on VPN), it fetches and injects remote properties — and those win over your application-local.yml. I wrote a whole TIL about having to pass -Dspring.cloud.config.enabled=false as a JVM arg to work around it.

Turns out the right fix is much simpler: don't put the config server import in application.yml at all.

The clean setup

application.yml — just the app name, no config import:

spring:
  application:
    name: myapp

Each environment gets its own profile file with the import:

application-dev.yml:

spring:
  config:
    import: "configserver:http://config.dev.example.com/configserver/config?fail-fast=true"

application-stg.yml:

spring:
  config:
    import: "configserver:http://config.stg.example.com/configserver/config?fail-fast=true"

application-prod.yml:

spring:
  config:
    import: "configserver:http://config.prod.example.com/configserver/config?fail-fast=true"

application-local.yml — no mention of config server at all. Just your local overrides.

Why this works

When you run with -Dspring-boot.run.profiles=local, Spring Boot only loads application.yml and application-local.yml. Since neither has a spring.config.import: configserver: line, the config server is never contacted. Your local properties win by default because there's nothing to compete with.

When you deploy with the dev profile, application-dev.yml is loaded and the import fires normally.

The query param style for fail-fast

I also noticed the profile files previously had spring.cloud.config.fail-fast: true as a separate property. That's redundant — configserver: without the optional: prefix already means the app will fail to start if the config server is unreachable. So ?fail-fast=true as a query param on the import URL (or just omitting optional:) is sufficient and keeps everything in one line.

Retry config also goes inline if you need it:

spring:
  config:
    import: "configserver:http://host/config?fail-fast=true&max-attempts=6&max-interval=1500"

Reference: Spring Cloud Config Client docs