PHP Memory Limit Question

Question

I just moved to a dedicated server and I was wondering whether i need to do anything explicitly inside wordpress config files to increase the performance of the site, like setting an upper memory limit.. is this really needed?

many thanks, Andy

Answer 1

Actually, you should take advantage of your server and move some of the load from the database (usually disk) to the memory. You could start by enabling the APC PHP extension and installing this plugin.

Answer 2

Nothing needs to be done in your WordPress configuration, just in PHP (in your server's php.ini file).

Answer 3

Actually WordPress does have an option within its wp-config.php file to set the maximum allowed memory that WordPress is allowed to consume. It defaults to 32MB.

WordPress will automatically check if PHP has been allocated less memory than the entered value before utilizing this function. For example, if PHP has been allocated 64MB, there is no need to set this value to 64M as WordPress will automatically use all 64MB if need be.

However if you want to allocate a specific memory amount to WordPress you can do so.

You can set it higher by simply adding one line:

define('WP_MEMORY_LIMIT', '64M');

That will increase the memory limit to 64MB obviously you can set it higher.

You can see more in the Codex Page on Wp-config.php