From 80803228fcd88a6c9f7c7551f3266e8e33c9ddc8 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Tony Le <tony.le@sentry.io>
Date: Wed, 25 Feb 2026 09:53:52 -0500
Subject: [PATCH] fix(spans): handle null span attributes

---
 src/sentry/spans/buffer.py        |  4 +++-
 tests/sentry/spans/test_buffer.py | 21 +++++++++++++++++++++
 2 files changed, 24 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)

diff --git a/src/sentry/spans/buffer.py b/src/sentry/spans/buffer.py
index eefee39ac856b0..67045208223d81 100644
--- a/src/sentry/spans/buffer.py
+++ b/src/sentry/spans/buffer.py
@@ -529,7 +529,9 @@ def flush_segments(self, now: int) -> dict[SegmentKey, FlushedSegment]:
                 span = orjson.loads(payload)
 
                 if not attribute_value(span, "sentry.segment.id"):
-                    span.setdefault("attributes", {})["sentry.segment.id"] = {
+                    if not isinstance(span.get("attributes"), dict):
+                        span["attributes"] = {}
+                    span["attributes"]["sentry.segment.id"] = {
                         "type": "string",
                         "value": segment_span_id,
                     }
diff --git a/tests/sentry/spans/test_buffer.py b/tests/sentry/spans/test_buffer.py
index 60752dc3492a87..16bd3e2655d78f 100644
--- a/tests/sentry/spans/test_buffer.py
+++ b/tests/sentry/spans/test_buffer.py
@@ -348,6 +348,27 @@ def test_observability_metrics_parent_span_already_oversized(
     )
 
 
+def test_flush_segments_with_null_attributes(buffer: SpansBuffer) -> None:
+    spans = [
+        Span(
+            payload=orjson.dumps({"span_id": "b" * 16, "attributes": None}),
+            trace_id="a" * 32,
+            span_id="b" * 16,
+            parent_span_id=None,
+            segment_id=None,
+            is_segment_span=True,
+            project_id=1,
+            end_timestamp=1700000000.0,
+        ),
+    ]
+
+    process_spans(spans, buffer, now=0)
+
+    rv = buffer.flush_segments(now=11)
+    segment = rv[_segment_id(1, "a" * 32, "b" * 16)]
+    assert segment.spans[0].payload["attributes"]["sentry.segment.id"]["value"] == "b" * 16
+
+
 @pytest.mark.parametrize(
     "spans",
     list(