Solve Nginx Error 413: Request Entity Too Large

Nginx’s default maximum accepted body size for client requests, or maximum file size that you can upload to a server running Nginx, is 1M. And when I try to upload more than 1M I get Nginx error 413: Request entity too large. This happens because Nginx refuses it. And please keep in mind that browsers do not know how to correctly show this error.

To correct this error is easy; you just need to give client_max_body_size a value. Follow the steps below to solve Nginx Error 413: Request entity too large:

1. Connect as root to your server with SSH.

2. Open the Nginx configuration:

vim /usr/local/nginx/conf/nginx.conf

3. Add client_max_body_size in the http section:

http {
    ....
    keepalive_timeout  65;
    client_max_body_size 20M;
    ....
}

Note: “….” means omitted.

4. Save the file and reload Nginx:

/usr/local/nginx/sbin/nginx -t
/usr/local/nginx/sbin/nginx -s reload

5. Test to upload using POST again; it should be working now.

For more reading visit Nginx HttpCoreModule