Inode frustration

[u/lbdesign]

After finally settling on SiteGround for my new quality webhost after fleeing closte.com, I am disappointed to get a warning that my "Inode usage" is at 80% with only 5 websites on a $50/mo plan. This feels like a cynical strategy to force clients into a $100/mo+ plan.

Am I crazy? I've never encountered a "too many inodes" issue in 30 years on the web.

[u/shiftpgdn]

What is your inode usag? Does SiteGround have your email? That's where a lot of it will come from.

[u/lbdesign → u/shiftpgdn]

With 5 domains, and 7 sites, it's 478,327 Used, 121,673 Free out of 600,000 inodes allowance.

I have zero email accounts on these domains. That's handled by Google Workspace. This is just website files :-/

[u/shiftpgdn → u/lbdesign]

WordPress sites? Check and make sure you don't have a bunch of backup files.

[u/lbdesign → u/shiftpgdn]

Thanks, yes I removed backups and am only using offsite backup now.

[u/lbdesign → u/lbdesign]

But this brings up another point: If they are going to offer email boxes with 10gb each, then that's the cap that should apply to the emails. Counting email files is like double-dipping, IMO.

[u/LibMike]

What's your inode usage? I can't even imagine using a company that has inode restrictions in 2026. Many web hosts give no inode limits for a few dollars a month plans.

[u/shiftpgdn → u/LibMike]

99% of shared hosts still use inode resrictions due to filesystems supported by cPanel. It's not abnormal.

[u/lbdesign → u/shiftpgdn]

Thank you. When these sites were at other hosts, nobody blinked. The reason for my surprise and suspicion is that I never even heard the term "inode" in 30 years of webhosting use.

[u/shiftpgdn → u/lbdesign]

Did you ask SiteGround support to help you find the source of the files?

[u/lbdesign → u/shiftpgdn]

Yes, they pointed to: MailPoet, Wishlist Member, and ACPT.

[u/lbdesign → u/LibMike]

With 5 domains, and 7 sites, it's 478,327 Used, 121,673 Free out of 600,000 inodes allowance.

I don't even have email accounts. This is just files. I do use MailPoet and FluentCRM. One site is a small membership site.

[u/LibMike → u/lbdesign]

It's a higher use than what a lot of people use. The inode limit concerns depend on what filesystems the host uses and how they manage things. Every company is different. You should expect to be able to use 65k per 1GB storage you have, so that's probably where the limits are coming from. Most hosts running cPanel and the other popular commercial panels are running filesystems with caps that will realistically never be hit, unless they're running super dense web hosting servers (putting tons of accounts on one system.) For example 3.5TB of storage would be around 225 million inodes on ext4. Some hosts care greatly about hard limits, some won't have a hard cap or advertised cap, and just contact the client if they ever think their use might become a concern.