Next.js 16.2 hits dev memory walls
Developers are reporting Next.js 16.2 dev servers consuming 10GB+ RAM in some setups, sparking optimization threads about full‑stack dev performance and memory usage. The issue is circulating on developer social channels as teams troubleshoot large monorepos and SSR dev workflows. (x.com)
A public minimal-repro repository shows a Next.js 16.2.0 App Router dev-mode leak where ArrayBuffer memory grows linearly with each request and is never reclaimed by GC. (github.com) A long-standing Next.js issue thread includes a report where a local next dev process rose from ~300 MB to roughly 9–10 GB after fetching all routes once before stabilizing. (github.com) A Vercel community post documents a macOS developer seeing the dev server exceed 12 GB of RAM about 30 minutes after startup while using --turbo, adding multiple independent reports of >10 GB local usage. (community.vercel.com) Next.js 16.2’s official release touts ~4x faster next dev startup and Turbopack improvements, while multiple new GitHub issues were opened against 16.2 for regressions and build failures (example issue #91642 and regression #91720). (nextjs.org) (github.com 1) (github.com 2) The Next.js project recently published a security advisory describing denial-of-service possibilities via Partial Prerendering that can exhaust memory by buffering unbounded POST bodies, underscoring known memory-exhaustion vectors in the codebase. (github.com) The repository and issue activity show maintainers pushing canary fixes (16.2.1-canary.*) and several active PRs and bug reports across the last week, indicating in-flight patches but no stable 16.2.x resolution at the time of these reports. (github.com)
