After this date, access to all legacy standard sandboxes will be permanently removed. If you haven't migrated, you will lose everything in your legacy sandbox. Don't wait on this one.
In This Article
In December 2025, HubSpot introduced a significantly improved Standard Sandbox and announced that legacy standard sandboxes would be sunset on March 16, 2026. If you're using a HubSpot sandbox environment today, this affects you directly.
The changes are genuinely positive for how sandbox environments should work - but there are some important things to sort out before the deadline, especially if you have connected apps, webhooks, or custom integrations pointing at your legacy sandbox.
What Actually Changed
The biggest shift is the removal of the resync feature and the introduction of a proper Deploy to Production workflow. Here's how the two environments compare:
Legacy Sandbox (Going Away)
- Could be resynced from production at any time
- No way to push changes back to production natively
- Frequent drift between sandbox and production
- No deployment logs or audit trail
- Changes had to be manually recreated in production
New Standard Sandbox
- No resync - recreate when you need a fresh copy
- Deploy to Production for supported asset types
- More accurate representation of your production account
- Deployment logs for transparency and troubleshooting
- Aligns with industry-standard dev environment practices
Why HubSpot Removed Resync
Resync felt convenient, but it introduced serious reliability problems. When you resynced a sandbox, you were pulling production data into an environment that had already been modified - creating unpredictable conflicts, overwriting sandbox work, and producing inconsistencies that were difficult to trace or resolve.
The result was sandbox environments that couldn't be trusted to accurately represent production behavior. Tests run in a resynced sandbox might pass for reasons that had nothing to do with the actual changes being tested.
Think of it like software development best practices: you don't "resync" a git branch with production mid-development. You start from a clean baseline, make your changes, and then deploy those specific changes back. That's the approach HubSpot is now enforcing.
When you need a fresh copy of production: delete the sandbox and create a new one. It sounds more painful than resync but it's actually cleaner and more predictable.
The New Deploy to Production Feature
This is the genuinely exciting part of the update. For years, HubSpot admins had to manually recreate every workflow, form, and property they built in sandbox back in production. That's now changing.
The new Deploy to Production feature lets you push supported assets directly from your sandbox to your live account. Currently supported asset types include forms, lists, marketing emails, object and property structures, and workflows involving those things.
Build and test a complex workflow in sandbox. When it's ready, deploy it directly to production - no manual rebuild, no risk of missing a step. Deployment logs give you an audit trail of exactly what was pushed and when.
This is something the HubSpot community has wanted for years. It's worth the migration effort.
Important caveat: Only newly created assets in the sandbox can be deployed. Edits to assets that were copied from production at sandbox creation cannot be deployed back. Plan your development workflow around this from the start.
Who Is Affected
Sandboxes are an Enterprise-tier feature, so this only applies to HubSpot Enterprise customers. If you're on Professional or lower, this change doesn't affect you.
If you're on Enterprise and currently have a legacy sandbox, you're affected. HubSpot has temporarily increased your sandbox limit so you can create a new standard sandbox while still accessing your legacy one - giving you time to migrate.
Most teams will experience minimal disruption. The exception is teams with connected apps, webhooks, or external systems pointing at the legacy sandbox Portal ID - those need more careful attention.
What You Need to Do: Step by Step
Audit your legacy sandbox
Log into your legacy sandbox and take inventory. Is there anything unfinished - workflows in progress, properties you haven't deployed yet, test data you still need? Since you can't automatically merge a legacy sandbox into a new one, you'll need to finish those items or accept rebuilding them.
Create your new standard sandbox
Any Super Admin can do this. Go to Account Settings > Sandboxes and create a new standard sandbox. This will be your environment going forward. HubSpot will copy supported assets from production at creation time.
Review connected apps and integrations
This is the most important step for technical teams. Every sandbox has a unique Portal ID. If any private apps, webhooks, or external systems reference your legacy sandbox's Portal ID, those will break when the sandbox is deleted. Make a full list before you do anything else.
Reconnect apps in the new sandbox
Reconnect private apps, regenerate API tokens and secrets, and update any external systems with the new sandbox's Portal ID. This step typically takes longer than expected - plan for it, especially in complex environments.
Validate and then delete the legacy sandbox
Once your new sandbox is fully operational and all integrations are confirmed working, delete the legacy sandbox. Your temporary sandbox limit increase will be removed once it's gone.
Special Consideration: Connected Apps & Integrations
This is where things can get complicated. The HubSpot community has flagged integration reconnection as the most underestimated part of this migration - consistently more time-consuming than expected.
For each connected app in your legacy sandbox, you'll need to: reconnect the app in the new sandbox, regenerate any API tokens or OAuth credentials, update webhook URLs and endpoint configurations, and update any external system that references the old sandbox Portal ID.
If you're running custom-coded workflow actions or private apps that communicate between HubSpot and external systems, budget extra time here. A simple setup might take a day. Complex environments with multiple integrations and webhooks can realistically take one to two weeks.
March 16 is a hard cutoff. After that date, your legacy sandbox is gone and so is everything in it. If you have ongoing work or connected integrations, start the migration now - not in March.
Common Questions
Do I lose my sandbox data if I don't migrate?
Yes. After March 16, 2026, legacy sandboxes will be permanently inaccessible. Anything inside - workflows in progress, test properties, custom objects - will be gone. You won't be able to retrieve it.
Can I still get a fresh copy of production?
Yes, but the process is now: delete your sandbox, create a new one. HubSpot will copy supported assets from production at creation time. There's no one-click resync, but the result is a cleaner, more reliable baseline.
What if I only use my sandbox occasionally?
You still need to migrate before the deadline. Even if your sandbox is mostly empty, you'll want to delete the legacy one and create a new standard sandbox so you're set up with the new Deploy to Production capability going forward.
Does this affect my production HubSpot portal?
No. Your live production account is completely unaffected. This is only about the sandbox testing environment.
If you have a complex sandbox environment with connected apps, integrations, or custom-coded solutions, we're happy to help you plan and execute the migration before the deadline. We've already been through this process with clients and know where the tricky parts are.
Book a free consultation and we'll make sure nothing falls through the cracks.