HTTP 413 Content Too Large

What does HTTP 413 mean?

The request body is larger than the server allows. Formerly “Payload Too Large”. Nginx returns it when an upload exceeds client_max_body_size (1 MB by default), and PHP-based sites when upload_max_filesize or post_max_size is too small.

4xx Client error: The request has a problem the client can fix: wrong URL, missing credentials, bad data or too many requests.

Common causes of a 413 error

• Uploading a file larger than the configured limit.
• Nginx default client_max_body_size 1m.

How to fix 413 Content Too Large

• Compress or resize the file before uploading.
• Raise client_max_body_size in Nginx or LimitRequestBody in Apache, and PHP’s upload limits.

413 and SEO

Not relevant for crawling.

Example response

HTTP/1.1 413 Content Too Large

How to return a 413 response

Node.js (Express)

res.status(413).json({ error: 'Content Too Large' });

PHP

http_response_code(413);

Python (Flask)

return {'error': 'Content Too Large'}, 413

Go (net/http)

w.WriteHeader(413)

nginx

return 413;

Related status codes

• 400 Bad Request — The server cannot process the request because it is malformed.
• 414 URI Too Long — The URL is longer than the server is willing to process.
• 431 Request Header Fields Too Large — The request headers, or a single header, are too large.

Check which status code a URL returns with the HTTP header checker.