Fix 'Disk quota exceeded' errors on Linux

Quick answer

Run quota -vs to see your current usage and limits. If you're over, delete files with find /home/youruser -type f -size +100M -exec ls -lh {} \; to find big ones, then rm them. For a permanent fix, ask your admin to raise your quota with edquota -u youruser.

What's actually happening here is that your Linux filesystem has per-user or per-group limits on disk space or inode count. When you try to write a file that pushes you past that limit, the kernel stops you with EDQUOT (errno 122). This usually shows up as "Disk quota exceeded" in shell commands, or write failed: Disk quota exceeded in apps. Common triggers: a runaway log file, a big download, or just accumulating cache files over months.

Step-by-step fix

Step 1: Check your quota usage

Run this to see what your limits are and how much you've used:

quota -vs

You'll see something like:

Disk quotas for user jdoe (uid 1001): 
     Filesystem  blocks   quota   limit   grace   files   quota   limit   grace
      /dev/sda1   99000   50000   55000   none       8       0       0

The blocks column is your current usage in 1K blocks. quota is the soft limit (you can exceed it during a grace period), limit is the hard limit (absolute maximum). If you're over the hard limit, you can't write anything until you free up space.

Step 2: Find big files in your home directory

Look for files over 100 MB:

find /home/youruser -type f -size +100M -exec ls -lh {} \;

Replace /home/youruser with your actual home path. That command prints file sizes and paths. If you're hitting inode limits (the files column in quota output), instead look for many small files:

find /home/youruser -type f | wc -l

Step 3: Delete or archive the culprits

Remove files you no longer need with rm. Be careful — there's no undo. For log files or cache directories you want to keep but shrink:

truncate -s 0 ~/.cache/large-cache-file

That empties the file without deleting it, which frees blocks immediately.

Step 4: Verify you're under the limit

Run quota -vs again. You should see blocks dropped below your quota. Now try writing a test file:

touch ~/testfile

No error means you're back in business.

What if you can't delete enough?

If you've cleared everything you can and still can't get under the limit, you need to ask your system administrator to raise your quota. They can do it with:

sudo edquota -u youruser

That opens an editor where they can increase the soft and hard limits. After saving, your new limits apply immediately — no reboot needed.

If you're on a shared hosting environment where you don't have sudo, you're stuck with asking support. Some hosts offer a control panel UI for quota management.

Preventing this in the future

Monitor your usage regularly

Throw this in your crontab to get a weekly email:

0 9 * * 1 quota -vs | mail -s "Your quota report" youruser@example.com

Set up log rotation

If you run services that generate logs, configure logrotate to keep only, say, 7 days of logs. For ~/logs/:

cat > ~/logrotate.conf << 'EOF'
/home/youruser/logs/*.log {
    weekly
    rotate 4
    compress
    missingok
    notifempty
}
EOF

Then run logrotate ~/logrotate.conf periodically.

Know your inode limits

Small files eat inodes faster than disk space. If your quota shows files near the limit, avoid creating thousands of tiny files — think about consolidating them into archives or databases.