Query Error with COUNT in InfluxDB 3: "Exceed file limit of 432 parquet files"

InfluxDB 3
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1

Hello everyone,

I’m currently working with InfluxDB 3 and encountering an issue when trying to count the total number of rows in a table.

When I run a simple query like:

SELECT count(filed) FROM my_table;

I get the following error:

query error: error while planning query: External error: Query would exceed file limit of 432 parquet files.

It seems the query is being blocked due to a file number limit when scanning through Parquet files.

My main questions are:

Has anyone faced a similar issue with InfluxDB 3 when performing aggregate queries like COUNT on larger tables? What does this limit mean?

If this method can’t be used to get the total row count, what is the recommended or alternative way to query the total number of records in a table in InfluxDB 3?

Any insights or workarounds would be greatly appreciated!

2

You’re hitting a known limitation in InfluxDB 3 Core, not a problem with COUNT() itself. One workaround would be to count over shorter time range like:

SELECT count(field)
FROM my_table
WHERE time >= now() - interval '24 hours';

Also you can try to raise this limit by changing the configuration but this can slow down qery performance as InfluxDB 3 doesn’t have compaction.

For efficient full‑history counts (months/years) upgrading to InfluxDB 3 Enterprise is recommended; it compacts files so long‑range queries stay performant.