How to Increase Maximum Upload File Size in WordPress?

Imagine this: You installed WordPress on your site thinking, ‘Oh wow...open source software...no.1 CMS...unlimited themes & plugins to choose from...I can do whatever I want!’ And the next thing you know, you can’t upload a high-res image or video because there’s a “Maximum upload file size”.

For most of you who visited this page to find a solution to that particular problem, it won’t be that hard to imagine.

You see, depending on your hosting provider and hosting plan or WordPress, there’s a limit to the size of a single file you can upload ⁠— It can be under 2 MB to above 1 GB. For instance, the limit you can see in the above screenshot is “8 MB”. 

However, this limit can be controlled. How? Well, there are quite a few ways, of which we’ll discuss four.

4 ways to increase “Maximum upload file size” on WordPress

1. Use a plugin

Using a plugin to add functionality is the most WordPress-y way to solve any problem. For this problem too, there’s a plugin: Increase Max Upload File Size in WordPress by Imagify.

Open your WordPress admin. Go to Plugins > Add New. Search for this plugin, and install it. You will find the option to access it in the Settings menu. 

From there, you can change the limit set by WordPress. However, if your web host has set the limit, this plugin is basically useless. In that case, you’ll need to look at the other options we’ve mentioned.

2. Add/Edit PHP configuration file

Firstly, find the PHP.Ini (PHP configuration file). If it’s there, it will be in the hosting root directory, which you can access via “file manager” in cPanel or your host’s control panel. If you are hosted on a shared plan, it won’t be there; in that case, create one: “php.ini”.

Open that file and add or edit the limit with the following code:

upload_max_filesize = 64M

post_max_size = 64M

The “64MB” here is a placeholder. Change it with whatever limit suits your requirement. 

The more GUI way

If you use cPanel, there’s another way to do the same thing - the interface way. Firstly, log in to cPanel.

Among the many elements you’ll find, there’s one “upload_max_filesize” with a dropdown menu. Select the maximum size you want to set.

For most of you, this is an excellent way to increase the maximum upload file size limit.

3. Edit .htaccess

.htaccess contains configurations of your servers, and similar to php.ini, you can locate it in the hosting root directory. 

Open the file and add the following at the end of it, just before “#END WordPress”:

php_value post_max_size 64M

php_value upload_max_filesize 64M

Again, “64M” here is a placeholder; change it with whatever you wish.

4. Ask

Overall

Increasing the maximum upload file size in WordPress isn’t that hard. On the one hand, you have readily available options like plugin and customer support. And on the other, you have manual options like modifying php.ini or .htaccess file.