Increasing File Upload size with a nginx nodejs droplet

Heya,

If you’re receiving a “413 Request Entity Too Large” error, it typically originates from Nginx, as this error message is indicative of the Nginx server refusing to process the request because the request body exceeds the size limit defined in its configuration.

Here are a few troubleshooting steps to help you narrow down and hopefully resolve the problem:

Nginx Configuration:

• Ensure you’ve modified the correct Nginx configuration file. Nginx can have multiple config files, especially if you’re using virtual hosts. Check your server block or virtual host configuration files, typically located in /etc/nginx/sites-available/ or /etc/nginx/conf.d/.

• If you’ve modified the client_max_body_size within a specific server block, ensure it’s not being overridden elsewhere.

• After making changes, always remember to reload or restart Nginx:

sudo systemctl reload nginx

Nginx Includes:

Nginx supports including other configuration files. Check if there are any additional configuration files being included that might be overriding your settings.

Proxy & Buffers:

If your Nginx is acting as a reverse proxy for a backend server (like Express), ensure you also configure the buffer sizes:

client_body_buffer_size 16k;
proxy_buffer_size   128k;
proxy_buffers   4 256k;
proxy_busy_buffers_size   256k;

Express/Node.js Configuration:

While the error message format you’ve shown is typical of Nginx, you should also check if there’s any body size limit set in your Express/Node.js application, especially if you’re using body parsers. For instance, with body-parser, you can set a limit:

app.use(bodyParser.json({limit: '200mb'}));
app.use(bodyParser.urlencoded({limit: '200mb', extended: true}));

Logs:

Check Nginx’s error logs for any relevant messages that could offer more insights:

sudo tail -f /var/log/nginx/error.log

Hi there,

With Nginx installed on a Droplet, there are no limits implied by DigitalOcean. This would only be the case for the App Platform.

With a Droplet, you have root access and you can adjust any of the configurations that you need.

What I could suggest checking the site-specific Nginx configuration under /etc/nginx/sites-available/. As if you have any client_max_body_size definitions in there this will override the ones that you’ve specified in the http directive.

Also, after making changes to the NGINX configuration, remember to restart or reload the service for the changes to take effect. You can do this by running sudo systemctl reload nginx or sudo service nginx reload.

Also, how large is the file that you are trying to upload?

And do you see any other errors in the Nginx error log:

tail -100 /var/log/nginx/error.log

Best,

Bobby