SDK 8 / sentry-cli 3: local Debug iOS builds hard-fail without SENTRY_ORG ("An organization ID or slug is required") — was warn-and-continue on 7.x

[moiseslorap-catalift]

OS

macOS 15

Platform

iOS

SDK

@sentry/react-native (sentry-expo config plugin path: @sentry/react-native/expo)

SDK version

8.17.1

React Native version

0.86 (Expo SDK 57)

Steps to reproduce

1. Expo SDK 57 project with @sentry/react-native@8.17.1 and the @sentry/react-native/expo config plugin.
2. Developer machine with no Sentry auth configured — no SENTRY_ORG / SENTRY_AUTH_TOKEN env, no sentry.properties with an org (the common case for a teammate or CI leg that isn't meant to upload).
3. npx expo prebuild -p ios + xcodebuild … -configuration Debug (local simulator build).

Expected result

Local Debug builds without upload credentials succeed, skipping source-map/debug-file upload — the behavior we observed on 7.x: the same project, same machine, same missing env built fine before the upgrade, only warning about the skipped upload.

Actual result

The "Bundle React Native code and images" phase hard-fails the build:

error: sentry-cli - error: An organization ID or slug is required (provide with --org, set SENTRY_ORG, or use an org-scoped auth token)

So after upgrading, every developer who doesn't export Sentry credentials can no longer produce a local Debug build until they discover SENTRY_DISABLE_AUTO_UPLOAD=true.

Workaround

export SENTRY_DISABLE_AUTO_UPLOAD=true before building (or setting it per-scheme). Works, but it's a hidden tribal-knowledge step — nothing in the upgrade guide flags that tokenless local builds now fail instead of warn.

Ask

Either (a) restore warn-and-continue when no org/token is configured (at least for Debug configuration), or (b) call this out loudly in the v8 migration docs as a breaking change for local builds. The v3 sentry-cli strictness makes sense for release/CI paths where a silent upload skip is a real footgun — but failing the local Debug inner loop on a missing org feels like the wrong default.

Are you willing to submit a PR?

Yes, if maintainers indicate which direction (a/b) is acceptable.

[linear-code]

RN-700