Uploading big files > 512MB

The default maximum file size for uploads is 512MB. You can increase this limit up to what your filesystem and operating system allows. There are certain hard limits that cannot be exceeded:

  • < 2GB on 32Bit OS-architecture

  • < 2GB with IE6 - IE8

  • < 4GB with IE9 - IE11

64-bit filesystems have much higher limits; consult the documentation for your filesystem.

Note

The Nextcloud sync client is not affected by these upload limits as it is uploading files in smaller chunks. See Client documentation for more information on configuration options.

System configuration

  • Make sure that the latest version of PHP is installed

  • Disable user quotas, which makes them unlimited

  • Your temp file or partition has to be big enough to hold multiple parallel uploads from multiple users; e.g. if the max upload size is 10GB and the average number of users uploading at the same time is 100: temp space has to hold at least 10x100 GB

Configuring your Web server

Note

Nextcloud comes with its own nextcloud/.htaccess file. Because php-fpm can’t read PHP settings in .htaccess these settings must be set in the nextcloud/.user.ini file.

Set the following two parameters inside the corresponding php.ini file (see the Loaded Configuration File section of PHP version and information to find your relevant php.ini files)

php_value upload_max_filesize 16G
php_value post_max_size 16G

The upload_max_filesize and post_max_size settings may not apply to file uploads through WebDAV single file PUT requests or Chunked file uploads For those, PHP and webserver timeouts are the limiting factor on the upload size.

Adjust these values for your needs. If you see PHP timeouts in your logfiles, increase the timeout values, which are in seconds:

php_value max_input_time 3600
php_value max_execution_time 3600

The mod_reqtimeout Apache module could also stop large uploads from completing. If you’re using this module and getting failed uploads of large files either disable it in your Apache config or raise the configured RequestReadTimeout timeouts.

There are also several other configuration options in your Web server config which could prevent the upload of larger files. Please see the manual of your Web server for how to configure those values correctly:

Apache

Apache with mod_fcgid

Note

If you are using Apache/2.4 with mod_fcgid, as of February/March 2016, FcgidMaxRequestInMem still needs to be significantly increased from its default value to avoid the occurrence of segmentation faults when uploading big files. This is not a regular setting but serves as a workaround for Apache with mod_fcgid bug #51747.

Setting FcgidMaxRequestInMem significantly higher than normal may no longer be necessary, once bug #51747 is fixed.

Apache with mod_proxy_fcgi

nginx

Since nginx 1.7.11 a new config option fastcgi_request_buffering is available. Setting this option to fastcgi_request_buffering off; in your nginx config might help with timeouts during the upload. Furthermore it helps if you’re running out of disc space on the tmp partition of your system.

Note

Make sure that client_body_temp_path points to a partition with adequate space for your upload file size, and on the same partition as the upload_tmp_dir or tempdirectory (see below). For optimal performance, place these on a separate hard drive that is dedicated to swap and temp storage.

If your site is behind a nginx frontend (for example a loadbalancer):

By default, downloads will be limited to 1GB due to proxy_buffering and proxy_max_temp_file_size on the frontend.

Configuring PHP

If you don’t want to use the Nextcloud .htaccess or .user.ini file, you may configure PHP instead. Make sure to comment out any lines .htaccess pertaining to upload size, if you entered any.

If you are running Nextcloud on a 32-bit system, any open_basedir directive in your php.ini file needs to be commented out.

Set the following two parameters inside php.ini, using your own desired file size values:

upload_max_filesize = 16G
post_max_size = 16G

Tell PHP which temp directory you want it to use:

upload_tmp_dir = /var/big_temp_file/

Output Buffering must be turned off in .htaccess or .user.ini or php.ini, or PHP will return memory-related errors:

  • output_buffering = 0

Configuring Nextcloud

As an alternative to the upload_tmp_dir of PHP (e.g. if you don’t have access to your php.ini) you can also configure a temporary location for uploaded files by using the tempdirectory setting in your config.php (See Configuration Parameters).

If you have configured the session_lifetime setting in your config.php (See Configuration Parameters) file then make sure it is not too low. This setting needs to be configured to at least the time (in seconds) that the longest upload will take. If unsure remove this completely from your configuration to reset it to the default shown in the config.sample.php.

Adjust chunk size on Nextcloud side

For upload performance improvements in environments with high upload bandwidth, the server’s upload chunk size may be adjusted:

sudo -u www-data php occ config:app:set files max_chunk_size --value 20971520

Put in a value in bytes (in this example, 20MB). Set --value 0 for no chunking at all.

Default is 10485760 (10 MiB).

Large file upload on object storage

Chunked file uploads do have a larger space consumption on the temporary folder when processing those uploads on object storage as the individual chunks get downloaded from the storage and will be assembled to the actual file on the Nextcloud servers temporary directory. It is recommended to increase the size of your temp directory accordingly and also ensure that request timeouts are high enough for PHP, webservers or any load balancers involved.