Manual:$wgMaxImageArea

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Images: $wgMaxImageArea
Don't thumbnail an image if it will use too much working memory.
Introduced in version:	1.6.0 (r11398)
Removed in version:	Still in use
Allowed values:	number (floating point)
Default value:	`12500000` (1.39+) `1.25e7` (1.6-1.38)
Other settings: Alphabetical \| By function

Details

This value specifies the maximum number of pixels a source image can have if it is to be scaled down by a scaler that requires the full source image to be decompressed and stored in decompressed form, before the thumbnail is generated. This provides a limit on memory usage for the decompression side of the image scaler.

If set to false, MediaWiki will not check the size of the image before attempting to scale it. Extensions may still override this setting by using the BitmapHandlerCheckImageArea hook.

The limit is used when scaling images with any of the built-in image scalers, such as ImageMagick or GD. It is ignored for JPEGs with ImageMagick, and also when using the VipsScaler , extension as these situations do not cause excess memory usage.

Default is 50 MB if decompressed to RGBA form, which corresponds to 12.5 million (1.25e7) pixels or 3500×3500.

To be clear, this only prevents server-side scaling of large images. Users are still allowed to upload large files.

Warning: If you increase this value, you may also need to increase $wgMaxShellMemory (Or if using GD as your image scaler, $wgMemoryLimit ).

Example code

Pixels		Code
25,000,000	5000×5000	`$wgMaxImageArea = 2.5e7;`
36,000,000	6000×6000	`$wgMaxImageArea = 3.6e7;`
49,000,000	7000×7000	`$wgMaxImageArea = 4.9e7;`
64,000,000	8000×8000	`$wgMaxImageArea = 6.4e7;`
81,000,000	9000×9000	`$wgMaxImageArea = 8.1e7;`
100,000,000	10000×10000	`$wgMaxImageArea = 10e7;`

Troubleshooting

File with dimensions greater than …

If you are uploading an image and you get this exception or a similar one:

Error creating thumbnail: File with dimensions greater than 12.5MP

You can increase the current value of the variable $wgMaxImageArea in your settings.

Unable to extend cache

If you are uploading an image and you already increased the above limit but you still get this error:

Error creating thumbnail: Unable to extend cache

Then try increasing the following related limits as well: