> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.risingwave.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Cluster limit

> This guide introduces the cluster limit designed to enhance user experience when cluster resources are limited. It sets a limit on the number of actors per parallelism (i.e., CPU core). Exceeding this limit when you create materialized view, table, or sink will trigger a warning message.

## Limit types

* **Soft limit**: `meta_actor_cnt_per_worker_parallelism_soft_limit`, defaults to 100.
  If exceeding this limit, creating materialized view, table, or sink can still succeed but will generate a SQL notice message when the statement returns.
* **Hard limit**: `meta_actor_cnt_per_worker_parallelism_hard_limit`, defaults to 400.
  If exceeding this limit, creating materialized view, table, or sink will fail and generate an error message when the statement returns.

## Notes

* The limit applies only when you create new materialized view, table, or sink. Existing database objects are unaffected.
* To resolve issues related to these limits, consider scaling the cluster or reducing the streaming job parallelism.
* Default limits may be adjusted in future releases.

## Override cluster limits

If it's safe for the cluster to operate with limits exceeded, you can override the default behavior using one of the following methods:

1. Bypass the limit check via session variable: `SET bypass_cluster_limits TO true`.
2. Increase the limit via meta developer config:

```bash theme={null}
[meta.developer]
meta_actor_cnt_per_worker_parallelism_soft_limit = 100
meta_actor_cnt_per_worker_parallelism_hard_limit = 400
```

<Warning>
  Please be aware that once you bypass the check or increase the limits, the cluster could become overloaded, leading to issues with stability, availability, or performance.
</Warning>

## Examples

Create a materialized view exceeding the soft limit

```bash theme={null}
CREATE MATERIALIZED VIEW test_cluster_limit_exceed_soft AS SELECT * FROM test;

----RESULT
NOTICE:
- Actor count per parallelism exceeds the recommended limit.
- Depending on your workload, this may overload the cluster and cause performance/stability issues. Scaling the cluster is recommended.
- Contact us via Slack or https://risingwave.com/contact-us/ for further enquiry.
- You can bypass this check via SQL `SET bypass_cluster_limits TO true`.
- You can check actor count distribution via SQL `SELECT * FROM rw_worker_actor_count`.
ActorCountPerParallelism { critical limit: 8, recommended limit: 7. worker_id_to_actor_count: ["1 -> WorkerActorCount { actor_count: 32, parallelism: 4 }"] }
CREATE_MATERIALIZED_VIEW
```

Create a materialized view exceeding the hard limit

```bash theme={null}
CREATE MATERIALIZED VIEW test_cluster_limit_exceed_hard AS SELECT * FROM test;

----RESULT
ERROR:  Failed to run the query

Caused by:
  Protocol error:
- Actor count per parallelism exceeds the critical limit.
- Depending on your workload, this may overload the cluster and cause performance/stability issues. Please scale the cluster before proceeding!
- Contact us via Slack or https://risingwave.com/contact-us/ for further enquiry.
- You can bypass this check via SQL `SET bypass_cluster_limits TO true`.
- You can check actor count distribution via SQL `SELECT * FROM rw_worker_actor_count`.
ActorCountPerParallelism { critical limit: 7, recommended limit: 6. worker_id_to_actor_count: ["1 -> WorkerActorCount { actor_count: 32, parallelism: 4 }"] }
```