fix: honor --full-refresh for unaltered views (#1404)

CHANGELOG.md

@@ -38,6 +38,7 @@
 - Warn when `contract.enforced: true` is set on a `materialized_view` model ([#1279](https://github.com/databricks/dbt-databricks/issues/1279))
 - Fix `materialized_view` models with `databricks_tags` silently going stale on `dbt run`. `MaterializedViewAPI._describe_relation` was not fetching `information_schema.tags`, so existing tags always parsed as empty, producing a spurious tag diff that routed the materialization to `ALTER ... SET TAGS` instead of `REFRESH MATERIALIZED VIEW` ([#1419](https://github.com/databricks/dbt-databricks/issues/1419))
 - Fix `dbt docs generate` failing with `RuntimeError: Tables contain columns with the same names ... but different types` during catalog merge across schemas ([#1392](https://github.com/databricks/dbt-databricks/issues/1392))
+- Fix view materialization incorrectly producing a no-op instead of forcing recreation when `--full-refresh` is provided alongside `view_update_via_alter: true` and `use_materialization_v2: true` ([#1404](https://github.com/databricks/dbt-databricks/issues/1404))
 
 ## dbt-databricks 1.11.7 (Apr 17, 2026)
 

dbt/include/databricks/macros/materializations/view.sql

@@ -86,6 +86,9 @@
 {% endmacro %}
 
 {% macro relation_should_be_altered(existing_relation) %}
+  {% if should_full_refresh() %}
+    {{ return(False) }}
+  {% endif %}
   {% set update_via_alter = config.get('view_update_via_alter', False) | as_bool %}
   {% if (existing_relation.is_view or existing_relation.is_metric_view) and update_via_alter %}
     {% if existing_relation.is_hive_metastore() %}

tests/functional/adapter/views/test_views.py

@@ -60,6 +60,22 @@ def test_view_update_nothing(self, project):
         assert results[0][2] == "This is the id column"
 
 
+class BaseUpdateFullRefresh(BaseUpdateView):
+    """Ensure that a full refresh forces a recreation even when there are no changes."""
+
+    def test_view_update_full_refresh(self, project):
+        util.run_dbt(["build"])
+        # Should not no-op, but we at least ensure it runs successfully.
+        # The logs should contain "Using replace_with_view" but we can't easily assert that.
+        util.run_dbt(["run", "--full-refresh"])
+
+        results = project.run_sql(
+            "describe extended {database}.{schema}.initial_view",
+            fetch="all",
+        )
+        assert results[0][2] == "This is the id column"
+
+
 class BaseUpdateTblProperties(BaseUpdateView):
     def test_view_update_tblproperties(self, project):
         util.run_dbt(["build"])
@@ -165,6 +181,22 @@ def project_config_update(self):
         }
 
 
+@pytest.mark.skip_profile("databricks_cluster")
+class TestUpdateViewViaAlterFullRefresh(BaseUpdateFullRefresh):
+    @pytest.fixture(scope="class")
+    def project_config_update(self):
+        return {
+            "flags": {"use_materialization_v2": True},
+            "models": {
+                "+view_update_via_alter": True,
+                "+persist_docs": {
+                    "relation": True,
+                    "columns": True,
+                },
+            },
+        }
+
+
 @pytest.mark.skip_profile("databricks_cluster")
 class TestUpdateViewViaAlterQuery(BaseUpdateQuery):
     @pytest.fixture(scope="class")