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Fix: WordPress Memory Exhausted Error – Increase PHP Memory

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Are you seeing an allowed memory size exhausted error message in WordPress?

This is one of the most common WordPress errors, and you can easily fix it by increasing the PHP memory limit in WordPress.

In this article, we will show you how to fix the WordPress memory exhausted error by increasing the PHP memory limit.

Fix: WordPress Memory Exhausted Error – Increase PHP Memory

What Is the WordPress Memory Exhausted Error?

WordPress is written in PHP, which is a server-side programming language. Additionally, every website needs a WordPress hosting server for it to function properly.

Web servers are just like any other computer. They need memory to efficiently run multiple applications at the same time. Server administrators allocate specific memory size to different applications, including PHP.

When your WordPress code requires more memory than the default allocated memory, you will see this error message:

Fatal error: Allowed memory size of 33554432 bytes exhausted (tried to allocate 2348617 bytes) in /home4/xxx/public_html/wp-includes/plugin.php on line xxx

Memory exhausted error displayed on a WordPress site

By default, WordPress automatically tries to increase the PHP memory limit if it is less than 64MB. However, 64MB is often not high enough.

Having said that, let’s see how to easily increase the PHP memory limit in WordPress to avoid the memory exhausted error.

Increase the PHP Memory Limit in WordPress

First, you need to edit the wp-config.php file on your WordPress site. It is located in your WordPress site’s root folder, and you will need to use an FTP client or file manager in your web hosting control panel.

Next, you need to paste this code in the wp-config.php file just before the line that says, ‘That’s all, stop editing! Happy blogging.’

define( 'WP_MEMORY_LIMIT', '256M' );
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This code tells WordPress to increase the PHP memory limit to 256MB.

Once you are done, you need to save your changes and upload your wp-config.php file back to your server.

Alternatively, you can use WPCode to insert this code snippet. It is the best WordPress code plugin that allows you to insert code snippets into your site’s files without editing them directly.

For more details, please see our guide on how to easily add custom code in WordPress.

You can now visit your WordPress site, and the memory exhausted error should have disappeared.

We also have a step-by-step guide on how to find and edit the wp-config.php file.

Note: If this solution does not work for you, then this means your web hosting service provider does not allow WordPress to increase the PHP memory limit. This is common if you are using shared hosting. You will need to ask your web hosting provider if they can increase your WordPress memory limit manually.

We hope this article helped you solve the WordPress memory exhausted error by increasing the PHP memory limit. You may also want to see our step-by-step beginner’s guide to troubleshooting WordPress errors, along with our expert picks for the best WordPress plugins to grow your site.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

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Reader Interactions

451 CommentsLeave a Reply

  1. Thanks for this article, we’ve been having this problem too.

    Which setting takes priority?
    In WHM (MultiPHP INI Editor), memory_limit is set to 32M.
    In wp-config.php WP_MEMORY_LIMIT is set to 96M.

    Reply

  3. but what exactly is this wordpress memory limit, like how much amount of RAM should wp use on the server? can anyone please share about what this thing is?

    thanks

    Reply

    • The memory limit tells WordPress how large requests/files can be for individual tasks, this is not for your site’s RAM and your RAM usage would be determined by what is on your site.

      Reply

      Admin

  4. thanks you wpbeginner
    you solve my problom
    but i have vps , can i increes more memory limit
    please reply

    Reply

    • You would need to reach out to your hosting provider for what is available to you

      Reply

      Admin

  6. Thanks for the post. It really worked out for me for my problem which was a big head ache for last 5days. Thanks a lot.

    Reply

  11. There needs to be a way to figure out these memory issues without taking the entire site offline or risking breaking the configuration by disabling essential components. Furthermore, the errors are occurring even when the memory limit is set to the maximum physical memory on the server (32GB) and while they are occurring there is no actual spike in memory usage (system utilities are reporting no increase in actual physical memory use.

    Reply

  12. Useless when the issue does not depend on actual required memory – in my case it keeps giving the error for random plugins no matter how much memory I specify (up to 32GB). Would be nice to know an actual troubleshooting method to see what is using the memory.

    Reply

  16. I wish I known that earlier. Now | lost a lot of traffic for my site.
    Hopefully it is fixed now!

    Reply

  24. It works, thank you <3

    The error was:
    Fatal error: Allowed memory size of 134217728 bytes exhausted (tried to allocate 491520 bytes) in…

    Reply

  26. Thank you so, so, so, sooooooooooo, so much! I guess as I add more posts to the database it requires more memory to operate. Various things were breaking with this internal error over the course of a couple of years, but since I could still make new posts I just said to myself, “meh, carry on.”

    Then I could no longer post! Panic! Everybody PANIC!!!

    I enabled debug mode. I got my debug report. I saw the memory exhausted reported. Then I found this page and gave it a try, thinking, “This probably won’t work. I’ve made too many changes to the theme and some of the plugins to work the way I want. Something somewhere got MuNgEd.

    Nope. Not at all. This one line of code solved it and got be back up and RUNNING!!!! Yay for me!!!! YAY FOR YOU!!!!

    Reply

  29. And if you have same problem in admin page you can also try

    define( ‘WP_MAX_MEMORY_LIMIT’, ‘512M’ );

    Administration tasks require much memory than usual operation. When in the administration area, the memory can be increased or decreased from the WP_MEMORY_LIMIT by defining WP_MAX_MEMORY_LIMIT.

    WP_MAX_MEMORY_LIMIT sets the maximum just on admin pages. It’s a terrible naming scheme but it dates back to WordPress 2.5 and nobody dares change it now

    Reply

  34. Thank you Thank you Thank you!
    A novice fixed this problem with your help! Thanks again

    Reply

  35. I have tried this, and now my entire admin panel and website are down, all blocked by that 500 error…. I cannot access anything anymore, and therefore can’t use the File Manager again to remove the change. I’m completely lost, any chance you can help me?

    Reply

    • Hi Laura,

      If you have access to cPanel dashboard then you can undo the changes from the file manager section there. Alternately, you can contact your hosting provider to help you fix this.

      Reply

      Admin

  36. i have to use wpml plugin issue is english language text editor working properly but when i text german or spanish language (secndery languages ) text editor cant showing on secndery languages text editor so ghow to fix that problem

    Reply

  37. I contacted my hosting company and requested them to increase my PHP memory, this resolved the issue.

    Reply

  40. Help! i have this problem :(

    Allowed memory size of 268435456 bytes exhausted (tried to allocate 10489856 bytes)

    Reply

  43. Thank you very much
    My issues got solved completely based on your detailed information and help.
    many many thanks
    Majid

    Reply

  44. I’m not as good at this stuff as I need to be, so I’m still struggling with this.

    I open the config.php file and there is a part that says:
    define( ‘WP_MEMORY_LIMIT’, ‘256M’ );

    only it already says:
    define(‘WP_MEMORY_LIMIT’, ‘1024M’);

    I’ve changed that to 2048 and 4096 with no change.

    But there is no ‘That’s all, stop editing! Happy blogging.’

    after the
    define(‘WP_MEMORY_LIMIT’, ‘1024M’);
    it says
    define(‘WP_DEBUG’, false);

    then
    # That’s It. Pencils down

    It does say ‘That’s all, stop editing! Happy blogging.’ in the Sample config.php but not in the actual one.

    Any advice?

    Reply

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