Read_file tool suddenly limited to files up to 2MB

Support Bug Reports
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1

Where does the bug appear (feature/product)?

Cursor IDE

Describe the Bug

Hello,

I am suddenly getting “file too large to read, was >2.00MB” errors on images that worked fine yesterday?

What happened:

January 7: I’m analyzing a 19MB PNG for a client project. Cursor reads it, analyzes it, everything works perfectly.

January 8 (today): Same exact file, same path. Now I get “too large to read, was >2.00MB” error.

I tested on both Sonnet 4.5 and Opus - same error on both.

The problem:

I work with Higgsfield Cinema Studio and other AI image tools. These output 6-18MB files normally. That’s just… standard for high-quality AI visual work. Midjourney upscales, video frames, professional image gen - all routinely over 2MB.

This 2MB limit basically makes Cursor unusable for any serious visual AI work.

Found the old thread:

I searched and found this thread from April 2025 where someone pointed out the same thing:

“It doesn’t make sense to be limited to only 2MB since the 1M context window of Gemini can ingest much more than this.”

That thread got closed after 30 days with no fix.

So this limit existed but wasn’t strictly enforced - until today apparently? Now it’s a hard block.

Why this sucks:

No changelog, no warning, no heads up. I’m mid-project on client work and suddenly I have to manually compress every image before Cursor can look at it. That’s workflow-breaking.

I’m paying $400/month for this tool. I can’t rely on something that silently changes behavior between sessions.

Can we get an official response on what changed and why? And ideally, can we get this limit raised to something reasonable like 25-50MB?

Thanks,
-Nick

Steps to Reproduce

Read image larger than 2mb

Expected Behavior

Normal behavior

Operating System

MacOS

Current Cursor Version (Menu → About Cursor → Copy)

Version: 2.3.29
VSCode Version: 1.105.1
Commit: 4ca9b38c6c97d4243bf0c61e51426667cb964bd0
Date: 2026-01-08T00:34:49.798Z (18 hrs ago)

For AI issues: which model did you use?

Sonnet 4

Does this stop you from using Cursor

Yes - Cursor is unusable

3

Hey @nickkrd1!

That’s not supposed to be what happens. I tried it out on my end and sent an 8.5mb file and Cursor processes it so that it can be sent to an LLM.

Could you share a Request ID with Privacy Mode disabled (Cursor Settings > General > Privacy).

4

Hi Colin,

Thanks for the quick reply and support! Relieving to hear.

Please let me know if this is what you were looking for?

Found Request IDs from Today’s Session:

Here are the tool call IDs from when we hit the 2MB errors (from today’s logs):

Error Instances:

11:02:38 AM - D1.png (6.4MB):

  • Tool Call ID: toolu_bdrk_01EeBKgx64iket1UHopDzmRL

  • File: /Users/nickkardan/Desktop/Frames/D1.png

  • Size: 6,397,141 bytes (6.4MB)

11:02:38 AM - 920d8ce8 (18.7MB):

  • Tool Call ID: (checking for second one…)

  • File: /Users/nickkardan/Desktop/Frames/Videos/E0 First/920d8ce8-f075-4276-b66a-4329e5331abf.png

  • Size: 18,760,990 bytes (18.7MB)

11:03:37 AM - Retry attempts:

  • Same files, same errors repeated

11:04:00 AM - Final retry:

  • D1.png again (6.4MB)

Give Cursor Support:

  • Tool Call ID: toolu_bdrk_01EeBKgx64iket1UHopDzmRL

  • Timestamp: 2026-01-08 11:02:38 AM PST

  • Error: “File is too large to read, was >2.00MB, size: 6397141 bytes”

  • File: D1.png (6.4MB)

  • Session: Cursor Version 2.3.29, VSCode 1.105.1

Thanks,

-Nick

5

Those aren’t exactly Request IDs, but in any case, we’ve looked into and found a regression. We’re sorting out next steps. But you can be assured that it’s not you, it’s us!

6

Ah! Well either way, thanks for the quick support, action and feedback. Very glad to hear! Will be patient on it.

7

Hey @nickkrd1!

Turns out it wasn’t a client release so the fix should already be in place for you. Give it a try in a couple minutes?

Thanks a lot for reporting this.