API/Platform Limit on Test Case & PBI Read Volume Causes Truncated Results (< 30 items per request)

[dhanveer16]

Description
There is a technical limitation in Azure DevOps (ADO)-MCP where the number of Test Cases and Product Backlog Items (PBIs) that can be read or exported in a single request is limited at fewer than 30 items. This constraint results in truncated payloads and prevents complete dataset retrieval for analysis, reporting, and coverage assessment.
Despite attempts to batch or paginate requests, the limitation persists across different endpoints and approaches, significantly impacting the QA team’s ability to gain full visibility into test coverage and traceability.
Impact

Incomplete Visibility: Results are truncated, leading to partial datasets and undermining confidence in metrics, dashboards, and audits.
Blocker: : MCP jobs that depend on comprehensive data cannot run reliably.

Expected Behavior

APIs and export functions should return all requested items—or support reliable pagination to obtain complete datasets.
The platform should not truncate results silently; if limits exist, they should be documented and configurable (per request and per endpoint).
Batch extraction should scale with predictable controls and clear error/limit signals.

Current Behavior

Read/export calls for Test Cases and PBIs return fewer than 30 items per request, even when more items exist in the source.

No clear error codes or warnings indicating partial response due to item limits.

Steps to Reproduce

Create a Test Plan with multiple suites and > 30 Test Cases.
Associate > 30 PBIs to Test Cases (many-to-many links).
Use MCP-ADO REST API or export functions to retrieve:

Test Cases within a suite/test plan
Linked PBIs for a given set of Test Cases

Observe that the response contains < 30 items.

[danhellem]

This is not the case. You can return more than 30 items. I use it all the time to return hundreds of items. That said, the LLM can get confused the more information you throw at it. So keeping the number manageable is important.

If you are seeing something different, please post a screen recording and turn on debug logging so we can get a little more info on what might be going on.