Documentation Source Text

</p>

<p>
The <a href="pragma.html#pragma_max_page_count">
max_page_count PRAGMA</a> can be used to raise or lower this
limit at run-time.
</p>

<p>
Note that the transaction processing in SQLite requires two bits
of heap memory for every page in the database file.  For databases
of a few megabytes in size, this amounts to only a few hundred
bytes of heap memory.  But for gigabyte-sized databases the amount
of heap memory required is getting into the kilobyte range and
for terabyte-sized databases, megabytes of heap memory must be
allocated and zeroed at each transaction.  SQLite will
support very large databases in theory, but the current implementation
is optimized for the common SQLite use cases of embedded devices
and persistent stores for desktop applications.  In other words,
SQLite is designed for use with databases sized in kilobytes or 
megabytes not gigabytes.  If you are building an application to
work with databases that are hundreds of gigabytes or more 
in size, then you should perhaps consider using a different database 
engine that is explicitly designed for such large data sets.
</p>
}
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