How to increase file descriptors max limit on Linux

Today my DBA reported that the server she was working on was spitting out “too many open files” errors and no new processes could be started.

This is a common problem with DB servers with heavy transactions. In my environment there are 6 DB instances running on the server. No quite the optimized setup I would say.

The fix was to increase the total file descriptors kernel parameter count in the /etc/sysctl.conf file. I doubled my limit from 8192 to 16384.

The walk through,

1. Find out what the current open file descriptor limit is.

~# more /proc/sys/fs/file-max

~# 8192

or

~# sysctl -a | grep fs.file-max

~# fs.file-max = 8192

2. View how many open file descriptors are currently being used.

~# more /proc/sys/fs/file-nr

~# 8191

3. View how many files are open. The number returned might defer as 1 file descriptor can have multiple open files attached to it.

~# lsof | wc -l

~# 10325

4. Edit the kernel paramneter file /etc/sysctl.conf and add line “fs.file-max=[new value]” to it.

~# vi /etc/sysctl.conf

fs.file-max = 331287

5. Apply the changes.

~# sysctl -p
~# fs.file-max = 331287

Problem fixed.

7 Responses to “How to increase file descriptors max limit on Linux”

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1. E.Marcus says:

   February 28, 2008 at 8:29 am

   For SuSe (10.3) boxes you can do the same with the ulimit command
   ulimit -Hn
   -H to set hardlimit
   -n to set number of open file descriptors

   or you can manually do it in
   /etc/security/limits.conf

   Reply
2. Danny says:

   February 28, 2008 at 10:22 am

   Thanks Marcus

   Reply
3. E.Marcus says:

   February 28, 2008 at 4:03 pm

   After researching a lil further, i found that the limits.conf only places the limits on the graphical login.

   if you want to put it on services. put the ulimit command in the boot script.

   One limitation i see of setting the FD limit in sysctl.conf is that it applies to every application. Unless you want every process to get that many FD’s. I would go for the boot script way of setting FD limits.

   Thoughts?

   Reply
4. Danny says:

   February 29, 2008 at 10:41 am

   Yup, ulimit will be user specific and sysctl method system wide. Since my box is for DB only it does not worry me too much.

   Thanks for the highlight man

   Reply
5. cucu says:

   March 5, 2008 at 9:34 pm

   hi malaysians…,vote wisely

   Reply
6. Jake says:

   April 26, 2008 at 3:28 am

   I’m having issue with a cups print server throwing the same error. I’ve increased the max file system wide as well as in limits.conf…cups still thinks 1024 is the default so it only allows 1/3 (341) connections…Thoughts?

   Reply