Promoting Content to New Environments
Liferay DXP 2026.Q1+
Liferay Archive (LAR) files allow for transferring content, data structures, and even whole sites between Liferay environments. Previously, exports always handled entities via the staging framework, which internally handles data with an XML structure.
As of Liferay DXP 2026.Q1, many types of entities in Liferay are handled internally as JSON, via the batch framework. These entries use external reference codes as unique identifiers between environments, which is more flexible and robust.
Batch-supported entities also bring several new features to LAR exports and imports, including lazy references to content, instance-level LAR export/imports, and improved import error reporting.
This added flexibility reinforces LAR exports and imports as a reliable way to promote and replicate content between environments. Some entities, however, don’t yet use the batch framework, so they don’t support these features. See the supported entity types for more information.
Batch-supported entities always import with the Mirror import strategy. The other strategies (Mirror with Overwriting and Copy as New) only work for site-level entities that don’t use the batch framework.
Lazy References
You can import batch-supported entries into another environment without importing referenced content. The included “lazy references” do not appear until the referenced content is also imported.
With lazy references, you can promote your content more flexibly, without worrying about missing reference errors for the referenced content. It also means that you can import any subset of that content in any order, as long as it also uses the batch framework.
Batch-based entries only support lazy references to other batch-based entries. If your content references other types of entities, they are still included in LAR exports by default, and they still function as dependencies.
Because they use lazy references, batch-supported entities do not include any referenced content in your LAR exports automatically. Carefully ensure your exports include the referenced content you also want to persist.
Instance-Level Content
You can export instance-level content, such as object definitions or roles with similar functionality to site-level content. All eligible entities for instance-level exports use the batch framework.
The scope of your LAR export (site or instance) also determines its import scope. See Exporting Data for more information.
Import Error Reporting
Because of lazy references, LAR imports can still complete even with some errors related to specific content. You can view the specific error details for an import process by clicking View Report Entries on the Import page.
See Importing Data with a LAR File for more information.
Batch-Supported Entity Types
As of Liferay 2026.Q1, these entities use the batch framework for LAR exports and imports.
| Entities | Instance or Site Level |
|---|---|
| Accounts | Instance |
| Account Groups | Instance |
| Categories | Site |
| Object Definitions | Instance |
| Object Entries | Instance and Site |
| Organizations | Instance |
| Pages and Page Templates | Site |
| Picklists | Instance |
| Roles | Instance |
| Tags | Site |
| Vocabularies | Site |
Future updates may add batch framework support for more entity types.