# Project Size - Too Large (?) **URL:** \ **Category:** Elements\ **Created:** [November 21, 2025, 4:46pm UTC](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/t/project-size-too-large/52638 "2025-11-21T16:46:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![johngee](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/forums.realmacsoftware.com/johngee/32/11202_2.png) [@johngee](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/u/johngee)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2025, 4:46pm UTC](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/t/project-size-too-large/52638/1 "2025-11-21T16:46:39Z")
**The issue** Is one of my projects simply getting too big? Should I be managing this better? **Background** Hobbyist. Been using Elements for about 4 months, 12 to 15 years of Rapidweaver before this. Currently got 2 sites online that are simple, small and not being developed (still made from Rapidweaver). My 2 other sites are also online and both made using Elements now, one fairly small, the other’s a bit of a beast (and growing). **The BIG project** Updated early yesterday using Elements 1.5.2 and it’s now reached 114MB. Three main pages and a much smaller and simpler privacy page. The main pages contain a 220kb hero banner image and around 160 further images each. These have been reduced using Squash, are 600px wide and are typically 85kb each. None of these banners or images are duplicated on other pages. I don’t feel I can realistically reduce image quality or size further, they only just look OK now when viewed as a lightbox image, I fear taking these down to 60 or 70kb would mean I ought to disable the lightbox effect. I have an imported heading font (460kb TTF) and a paragraph font (54kb TTF) stored under Resources. I was referring to something on the large site yesterday, I was in the street in an area with 4G coverage and it all seemed a bit slow and clunky, probably not surprising. **The question(s)** Should I be doing something differently? Can the site continue to grow to 130MB? 150MB? At what point do things stop being sustainable (am I past that point already)? **Finally** It’s a hobby. I’m hoping for a simple solution, I’m not really looking at throwing $500 at this. I can’t be the only person in this situation so what have others done to resolve this sort of thing? Thanks in advance for any thoughts or help offered. 🙏 ---
**Author:** ![jbob](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/forums.realmacsoftware.com/jbob/32/31581_2.png) [@jbob](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/u/jbob)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2025, 5:40pm UTC](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/t/project-size-too-large/52638/2 "2025-11-21T17:40:52Z")
John - It maybe worth exporting your site to your hard disk. Then look at the files via the finder - arranged from biggest first … and just check that the file sizes marry with your expectations. Usually, there’s something no quite as you expect, Jol ---
**Author:** ![jbob](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/forums.realmacsoftware.com/jbob/32/31581_2.png) [@jbob](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/u/jbob)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2025, 5:45pm UTC](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/t/project-size-too-large/52638/3 "2025-11-21T17:45:50Z")
Good one John - I just did this and I have 4 image files over 4Mb and quite a lot over 300k - which is normally my ceiling. That’ll keep me busy for a while : ) Be great Dan to see a few failsafes built in so that big files get flagged Jol ---
**Author:** ![MichaelDroste](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/forums.realmacsoftware.com/michaeldroste/32/37212_2.png) [@MichaelDroste](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/u/MichaelDroste)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2025, 5:49pm UTC](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/t/project-size-too-large/52638/4 "2025-11-21T17:49:08Z")
Mine is over 3 gigabytes the site is 17mb but the media is huge 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![johngee](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/forums.realmacsoftware.com/johngee/32/11202_2.png) [@johngee](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/u/johngee)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2025, 5:57pm UTC](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/t/project-size-too-large/52638/5 "2025-11-21T17:57:18Z")
Jol, Thanks for the advice, that’s a job for tomorrow. John ---
**Author:** ![MichaelDroste](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/forums.realmacsoftware.com/michaeldroste/32/37212_2.png) [@MichaelDroste](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/u/MichaelDroste)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2025, 6:08pm UTC](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/t/project-size-too-large/52638/6 "2025-11-21T18:08:00Z")
Very good idea 👍 ---
**Author:** ![ajenks](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/forums.realmacsoftware.com/ajenks/32/34693_2.png) [@ajenks](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/u/ajenks)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2025, 6:20pm UTC](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/t/project-size-too-large/52638/7 "2025-11-21T18:20:23Z")
I would look into warehousing the images somewhere else so there not a part of your project file. ---
**Author:** ![differentdan](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/forums.realmacsoftware.com/differentdan/32/33530_2.png) [@differentdan](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/u/differentdan)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2025, 6:28pm UTC](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/t/project-size-too-large/52638/8 "2025-11-21T18:28:48Z")
> [@johngee](#): > > Updated early yesterday using Elements 1.5.2 and it’s now reached 114MB Objectively that’s not really that big. 🙂 I feel like the historical advice regarding large project files is a remnant from earlier versions of RapidWeaver where the app could become unstable when working with mutli-GB sized project files. There were other things in play as well such as third-party plugins that could add to the instability (various image gallery stacks, etc.), along with Apple’s use of Intel processors which were a lot less performant than their new Apple Silicon chips, and their woefully inadequate RAM in base models. With the above said I haven’t really put multi-GB sized project files through the ringer in Elements yet, so YMMV. Good news though is I haven’t seen any reports of project file instability in Elements so far. 🦸‍♂️ But the general advice has always been to warehouse your resources (images, videos, audio, etc.) as those are about 99% of where project file bloat comes from, although unfortunately this adds complexity which some people don’t want to deal with. Also important to note, project file performance in Elements is not the same as website performance once you export it to your web server. Your project file could be large, but the exported website could still perform quite well once published depending on how you’ve optimized it. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![johngee](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/forums.realmacsoftware.com/johngee/32/11202_2.png) [@johngee](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/u/johngee)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2025, 7:00pm UTC](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/t/project-size-too-large/52638/9 "2025-11-21T19:00:05Z")
Arlen, Might need to think about that (used to do that 10+ years ago, warehoused images at various sizes for different devices / screen sizes I seem to recall). Will give it some thought, thank you. John ---
**Author:** ![johngee](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/forums.realmacsoftware.com/johngee/32/11202_2.png) [@johngee](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/u/johngee)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2025, 7:10pm UTC](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/t/project-size-too-large/52638/10 "2025-11-21T19:10:34Z")
Dan, Many thanks. Warehousing - have I not seen you say on an Elements video that warehousing is largely a redundant concept these days? Perhaps you were referring to less image rich webpages. Website optimisation - I have Lazy Loading applied to below the fold images. I’m not sure if there are other Elements features of this nature, might have to see what your bot has to say on the subject. John ---
**Author:** ![differentdan](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/forums.realmacsoftware.com/differentdan/32/33530_2.png) [@differentdan](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/u/differentdan)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2025, 7:24pm UTC](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/t/project-size-too-large/52638/11 "2025-11-21T19:24:12Z")
> [@johngee](#): > > Warehousing - have I not seen you say on an Elements video that warehousing is largely a redundant concept these days? Perhaps you were referring to less image rich webpages. Different Dan 😄. We have differing opinions on warehousing, although maybe not? From a technical perspective, I think warehousing is fantastic. From a user experience perspective, I think it’s terrible. 🤣 If you are working with hi-res photos, like you are a professional photographer showcasing your works, or if you are a videographer showcasing 4K footage, or if you are @MichaelDroste showcasing hundreds of files of audio, warehousing makes a lot of sense from a performance and technical perspective. If you are just building a regular website with some highly compressed images, a few 720 or 1080P vidoes, and maybe some .mp3 audio files, I think warehousing is overkill. 🙂 > [@johngee](#): > > Website optimisation - I have Lazy Loading applied to below the fold images. I’m not sure if there are other Elements features of this nature, might have to see what your bot has to say on the subject. Lazy loading is great! Using Squash to compress your images is also great. I’d also recommend checking out Cloudflare (or some other CDN), as those offer other performance enhancements. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![jbob](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/forums.realmacsoftware.com/jbob/32/31581_2.png) [@jbob](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/u/jbob)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2025, 7:30pm UTC](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/t/project-size-too-large/52638/12 "2025-11-21T19:30:07Z")
![image](https://europe1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/uploads/realmacsoftware1/original/3X/4/8/48ea8d1f4c9e62604051f5876aacb555cf7bc531.jpeg) Image size suggestion … green if it’s below 200kb amber if between 200-400kb red if it’s over 400kb ?? ---
**Author:** ![johngee](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/forums.realmacsoftware.com/johngee/32/11202_2.png) [@johngee](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/u/johngee)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2025, 7:34pm UTC](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/t/project-size-too-large/52638/13 "2025-11-21T19:34:52Z")
> [@differentdan](#): > > Different Dan 😄. Ooops, careless on my part, sorry. ---
**Author:** ![differentdan](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/forums.realmacsoftware.com/differentdan/32/33530_2.png) [@differentdan](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/u/differentdan)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2025, 8:39pm UTC](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/t/project-size-too-large/52638/14 "2025-11-21T20:39:23Z")
No worries, happens a fair bit. Perhaps my new username will fix that. 🤣 ---
**Author:** ![johngee](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/forums.realmacsoftware.com/johngee/32/11202_2.png) [@johngee](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/u/johngee)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2025, 8:52pm UTC](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/t/project-size-too-large/52638/15 "2025-11-21T20:52:36Z")
👍