PHP memory limit

The PHP memory_limit is the maximum amount of server memory that each PHP script is allowed to consume.

Per the PHP documentation:

“This sets the maximum amount of memory in bytes that a script is allowed to allocate. This helps prevent poorly written scripts from eating up all available memory on a server.”

The default value is 128MB. Often, this is raised depending on the amount of memory needed for the web application.

When the PHP script exceeds the limit, you will receive an error similar to the following example:

Fatal error: Allowed memory size of x bytes exhausted (tried to allocate x bytes) in /example/php/script
PHP Fatal error: Out of memory (allocated x) (tried to allocate x bytes) in /example/php/script

You can increase the memory_limit by editing the php.ini file. You should look for a line cthat starts with memory_limit:

memory_limit = 256M

Be aware that the server has a physical memory limit. You should optimize your code if the memory_limit parameter is already set too high.