How to fix Error: ENOSPC: System limit for number of file watchers reached in Git

First, check your current inotify watches limit and how many are in use:

# Check the current maximum number of inotify watches
cat /proc/sys/fs/inotify/max_user_watches

# Check current usage (approximate)
find /proc/*/fd -lname anon_inode:inotify 2>/dev/null | wc -l

# More detailed view of inotify usage per process
for pid in $(pgrep -u $USER); do
  count=$(find /proc/$pid/fd -lname 'anon_inode:inotify' 2>/dev/null | wc -l)
  if [ "$count" -gt 0 ]; then
    echo "$count $(cat /proc/$pid/comm 2>/dev/null)"
  fi
done | sort -rn | head -20

The default limit varies by distribution:
- Ubuntu/Debian: 8192 (older) to 65536 (newer)
- Fedora/RHEL: 8192
- Arch Linux: 8192

For development work, you typically need 100,000 to 500,000 watches.

Before making permanent changes, test if increasing the limit fixes your issue:

# Temporarily increase to 524288 (requires sudo)
sudo sysctl fs.inotify.max_user_watches=524288

# Verify the change
cat /proc/sys/fs/inotify/max_user_watches

This change is temporary and will reset on reboot. If this fixes your problem, proceed to make the change permanent.

Note: You may need to restart the application that was failing (VS Code, webpack, etc.) for it to successfully acquire new watches.

To make the change persist across reboots, add it to your sysctl configuration:

Option 1: Create a new sysctl config file (recommended)

# Create a new config file
echo "fs.inotify.max_user_watches=524288" | sudo tee /etc/sysctl.d/50-inotify.conf

# Apply the change immediately
sudo sysctl -p /etc/sysctl.d/50-inotify.conf

Option 2: Add to the main sysctl.conf

# Append to sysctl.conf
echo "fs.inotify.max_user_watches=524288" | sudo tee -a /etc/sysctl.conf

# Apply the change
sudo sysctl -p

Verify the permanent change:

# Should show 524288
cat /proc/sys/fs/inotify/max_user_watches

# Verify it's in the config
grep max_user_watches /etc/sysctl.d/*.conf /etc/sysctl.conf 2>/dev/null

The value 524288 (512K) is sufficient for most development workflows. For extremely large monorepos, you might use 1048576 (1M).

After increasing the limit, restart the applications that were failing:

For VS Code:
1. Close all VS Code windows completely
2. Optionally run code --extensions-dir /tmp/test to verify it works
3. Reopen VS Code normally

For terminal-based watchers:

# Restart your development server
# Ctrl+C to stop, then restart
npm run dev
# or
yarn dev

For webpack/Vite:

# Stop any running dev servers
pkill -f webpack
pkill -f vite

# Restart your build tool
npm run watch

For Git integration issues:

# Test Git directly
git status

# If using Git in an IDE, restart the IDE

Applications that failed to acquire watches when the limit was reached will now succeed.

If you prefer not to increase the limit significantly, or if you're on a system where you can't change it, reduce watch usage:

Exclude node_modules in VS Code:
Add to .vscode/settings.json:

{
  "files.watcherExclude": {
    "**/node_modules/**": true,
    "**/.git/objects/**": true,
    "**/.git/subtree-cache/**": true,
    "**/dist/**": true,
    "**/build/**": true,
    "**/.next/**": true
  }
}

Configure webpack to ignore node_modules:

// webpack.config.js
module.exports = {
  watchOptions: {
    ignored: /node_modules/,
  },
};

Use polling instead of inotify (last resort):

# For webpack
CHOKIDAR_USEPOLLING=true npm run dev

# Or in webpack config
watchOptions: {
  poll: 1000,
  ignored: /node_modules/
}

Polling uses more CPU but doesn't consume inotify watches.

If you're using Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL), there are additional considerations:

WSL2 has its own inotify limits:

# Check WSL version
wsl --list --verbose

# Inside WSL, increase the limit the same way
echo "fs.inotify.max_user_watches=524288" | sudo tee /etc/sysctl.d/50-inotify.conf
sudo sysctl -p /etc/sysctl.d/50-inotify.conf

Cross-filesystem watching issues:
When watching files on the Windows filesystem from WSL (/mnt/c/), inotify doesn't work reliably. For best results:
- Keep your project files inside the Linux filesystem (~/projects/ not /mnt/c/)
- Use VS Code with the Remote-WSL extension

WSL1 specific:
WSL1 has limited inotify support. Consider upgrading to WSL2 for better file watching.

Restart WSL if changes don't take effect:

# From PowerShell (as admin)
wsl --shutdown
# Then reopen your WSL terminal