Cache folder getting huge (over 80 GB)

Same thing happening for me. Started one week ago. It’s getting progressively worse. The Empty Cache command doesn’t work either. This is a major bug/problem with W3 Total Cache. There are other reports of this on Reddit too.

Hello @w-sky

Thank you for reaching out and I am happy to help!
The page is cached once visited, so depending on your settings, the cache may take up a lot of space. This depends on how big is the website and the configuration. Purging the cache does not delete the files. It creates the _old files (stale cache) in order to serve the cache to the users before the newly cached files are created. The option in Performance>Page Cache>Advanced>Garbage Collection interval is responsible to delete the _old files depending on the interval set.
Now I metnioned that the it depends on the settings, so if you have cache preload set, the cache expiery set for a long time and possibly GCI is set to higher value, the cache folder may increase over time.
The GCI, depends on a Cron and if the wp-cron is disabled there is nothing to call for the action.
Regarding the Object Caching, this also depends on the website, and generally it’s not recommended to use Disk caching solution for Object Caching or Database Caching.
For the bi website, it’s recommended to use a memory-based caching solution like Redis or Memcached.
Please manually delete the cache folder and check the settings and the things I’ve mentioned.

@daveslc Can you please clarify on how the Emtpy Cache command does not work? I’ve tested this and I can always clear the cache so can you please share the website URL, and also, pelase share the links to those reports on Reddit as I was not able to find them.

Thanks!

I’m seeing the same behavior on several sites. Where the disk based object cache in particular keeps increasing and clearing the cache has no effect.

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Hello @straitline

Thank you for your feedback.
This is one of the reasons why the Object Cahing option should be used only with Memory-based Caching insteead of Disk.
Do you have the option to Use Redis or Memcached?

Thanks!

Hi @vmarko
Thanks for the update here, I had seen that guidance, is that a new concern? These sites have been setup this way for years and have just now started to have this disk usage problem.

Hello @w-sky

Sorry for the late reply.

It’s a recent concern lets put it like that. The problem is with the files and object cached on Disk are remaining longer when using persistant object Caching and if the website grows, the more files are present.
Please make sure to use memory-based caching instead.

Thanks!

I am running into the same issue. After a cache flush/purge through the web admin dashboard or the WP-CLI, the cache folder size remains unchanged.

Not in all environments, it is possible to use memory based caching.
And if this hasn’t been an issue before but just recently became one, I believe this is worth looking into.

I’m still having the same trouble, and in attempting to clear out the 20gb cache folder this morning, I noticed that randomly some of the folders end up owned by root, not sure if this is causing some of the issue with the plugin not clearing these folders.

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