ECF PDF size limits, court by court — and what to do when your file is too large

Federal CM/ECF size limits range from 3 MB to 200 MB depending on which court you're filing in. Here is the table, with .gov citations — plus a plain-English walkthrough of how to actually meet a limit.

Jump to the size-limit table See how to compress for court

Why CM/ECF size limits vary so much

There is no single PACER-wide PDF size cap. Each of the 94 federal district courts, plus the bankruptcy courts and the appellate circuit courts, runs its own CM/ECF server and sets its own per-document size limit. Some courts cap at roughly 3 MB (a handful of bankruptcy districts on older infrastructure); others cap at 200 MB (the U.S. Court of Federal Claims, currently the federal high-water mark). Most federal district courts land between 35 MB and 50 MB. Bankruptcy courts skew lower — often 10–35 MB. Appellate courts typically cap at 30–50 MB but route oversize briefs through alternative submission channels rather than reject outright.

The variation reflects three things: the age and capacity of the court's IT infrastructure, the local rule the court has chosen, and — in some districts — a soft 'practical' cap that sits below the technical maximum. The Northern District of California is the cleanest example: 50 MB technical, 30 MB practical, with anything over 30 MB requiring an alternative-submission link under Civil Local Rule 5-1(g)(4). When a court publishes both numbers, the practical cap is the one to plan against.

PDF size limits by federal court

The table below covers federal district courts, bankruptcy courts, and appellate circuits. Limits change occasionally as courts upgrade infrastructure — always confirm against your court's own CM/ECF FAQ page (linked in each row) before filing. For state e-filing portals (Texas eFile, California Tyler portals, and similar), check your state's e-filing vendor documentation; this guide covers federal only.

Court	Type	Per-file limit	Source (.gov)
PACER / CM/ECF (general)	Authoritative pointer	varies — set per court; use the CM/ECF Lookup	pacer.uscourts.gov
U.S. Court of Federal Claims	Specialty federal	200 MB	uscfc.uscourts.gov
W.D. Washington (WAWD)	District	75 MB	wawd.uscourts.gov
E.D. Pennsylvania (PAED)	District	50 MB	paed.uscourts.gov
N.D. California (CAND)	District	50 MB technical (30 MB practical, L.R. 5-1(g)(4))	cand.uscourts.gov
W.D. Texas (WDTX)	District	50 MB	txwd.uscourts.gov
D. District of Columbia (DDC)	District	50 MB	cmecfdata.com (DDC)
W.D. Louisiana (LAWD)	District	50 MB	lawd.uscourts.gov
N.D. Illinois (NDIL)	District	35 MB	ilnd.uscourts.gov
C.D. California (CACD)	District	35 MB	cacd.uscourts.gov
S.D. Texas (TXSD)	District	35 MB	txs.uscourts.gov
N.D. Texas (TXND)	District	35 MB	txnd.uscourts.gov
N.D. Georgia (GAND)	District	30 MB	gand.uscourts.gov
W.D. Michigan (MIWD)	District	35 MB combined	miwd.uscourts.gov
N.D. Iowa (IAND)	District	15 MB	iand.uscourts.gov
S.D. New York (SDNY)	District	10 MB per attachment (15 MB for Pro Hac Vice)	nysd.uscourts.gov
D. Massachusetts (MAD)	District (extreme low)	2 MB	mad.uscourts.gov
U.S. Bankruptcy Court — C.D. California (CACB)	Bankruptcy	50 MB	cacb.uscourts.gov
U.S. Bankruptcy Court — S.D. California (CASB)	Bankruptcy	35 MB	casb.uscourts.gov
U.S. Bankruptcy Court — N.D. Alabama (ALNB)	Bankruptcy	35 MB	alnb.uscourts.gov
U.S. Bankruptcy Court — D. Wyoming (WYB)	Bankruptcy	15 MB	wyb.uscourts.gov
U.S. Bankruptcy Court — D. Delaware (DEB)	Bankruptcy	10 MB (raised from 7 MB)	deb.uscourts.gov
U.S. Bankruptcy Court — E.D. Louisiana (LAEB)	Bankruptcy	see court's bookmark + size guidance	laeb.uscourts.gov
U.S. Court of Appeals — Federal Circuit (CAFC)	Appellate	per Electronic Filing Procedures (May 2025)	cafc.uscourts.gov
U.S. Court of Appeals — 9th Circuit	Appellate	per CM/ECF user guide + PDF Technical Guide	ca9.uscourts.gov
U.S. Court of Appeals — D.C. Circuit	Appellate	per Circuit Rules (current revision)	cadc.uscourts.gov
U.S. Court of Appeals — 1st Circuit	Appellate	per PACER CM/ECF Lookup record	pacer.uscourts.gov (01CA)

Source aggregator for the full 94-district + 90+ bankruptcy + 13 appellate set: cmecfdata.com. We recommend confirming any limit shown here against the court's own .gov FAQ — that link is in the Source column for every row.

What to do when your PDF is over the limit

Four steps. Step 1 is research; Steps 2 and 3 happen inside FileHop; Step 4 is upstream of any PDF tool — at the scanner.

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Step 1: Check your court's exact limit before you do anything else

Go to the table above and find your court. Then click through to the court's own CM/ECF FAQ page to confirm the limit has not changed recently — courts upgrade infrastructure quietly and bump caps without an announcement. If your court is not in the table, use PACER's Court CM/ECF Lookup (linked in the table footer) to find the canonical source. Write the number down before you start compressing — it is easier to land under 35 MB if you know you have 35 MB than if you are guessing 'somewhere around 30'.
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Step 2: Compress the PDF (and strip the metadata while you are at it)

Open FileHop, choose PDF → Compress, and turn on 'Remove metadata'. Pick a quality tier — for scan-heavy briefs and exhibits, the medium tier typically yields a 60–80% size reduction with no readability loss; for image-heavy filings, low quality may be needed; for text-only briefs you may not need to compress at all. The metadata strip removes author, producer, creation and modification timestamps, and XMP — anything that would betray which workstation produced the file or expose tracked-changes residue. This step runs on your computer; the file is not uploaded. If the output is still over the limit, re-run at a lower quality tier or move to Step 3. Note: FileHop's compression is quality-tiered, not size-targeted — you pick a tier and check the result, rather than entering an exact MB target.
→ Open the PDF Compressor
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Step 3: If compression is not enough, split into parts

If the file will not compress under the limit without unacceptable quality loss, split it. Use FileHop's Split PDF tool (PDF → Split) to break the brief into volumes — most courts accept a brief filed as 'Part 1 of 3', 'Part 2 of 3', 'Part 3 of 3' as separate CM/ECF entries on the same docket. Each part should have its own caption page and a page-range indicator. Some courts (notably the Central District of California) explicitly recommend sub-volumes for any exhibit set over the cap; some bankruptcy districts require it. Check your court's local rules.
→ Open the PDF Splitter
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Step 4: For scanned briefs — fix at the source

If your filing is mostly scanned pages (depositions, contracts, third-party documents), the size problem usually starts at the scanner, not at the PDF. Scan text-only pages at 300 DPI black-and-white (1-bit), not color or grayscale. A 50-page text scan that is 80 MB in color drops to around 4 MB in black-and-white with no readability loss. If your court requires text-searchable PDFs (most do for briefs; many do for exhibits), run OCR in your scanner driver or in Adobe Acrobat upstream — FileHop's cloud OCR is opt-in and is the right choice when you want OCR but not when you want a fully-local workflow.

What actually counts against the limit

The size limit applies per PDF file, not per filing. Knowing what drives a file's bytes helps you decide whether to compress, split, or rescan.

The size limit applies per PDF file, not per filing. A 100-page brief filed as one 30 MB PDF passes a 35 MB cap; the same brief filed as one 50 MB PDF fails — even if your overall case docket is small.
Embedded images are the single largest size driver. A brief that is 80% scanned exhibit images will be five to ten times larger than the same brief with the images at native resolution.
Embedded fonts and OCR text layers add roughly 1–5 MB to a typical brief but rarely cause a rejection on their own.
PDF metadata (author, producer, timestamps, XMP) adds bytes, but the bigger risk is professional — FileHop's Compress with metadata-removal handles both in one pass.
Multiple-attachment filings count each attachment separately against the cap. If you file a 50-page motion plus six exhibits, each PDF is independently subject to the court's limit. Combine where the rule allows; split where it does not.

Why this compression workflow runs locally

The compression and split steps in this guide all run on your computer. Here is what 'local' means in practice, stated honestly.

•Files are processed on your computer. Compression, metadata strip, and split all run inside the FileHop desktop app — your brief does not transit our servers.
•No telemetry on file contents. We do not log which brief you compressed, how large it was, or what court you were filing in.
•No AI training on your files. We do not use your documents to train models.
•Open output format. FileHop writes standard PDF — no proprietary container, no lock-in, opens in any PDF reader your court uses.
•Honest scope: cloud OCR is opt-in and clearly labelled in the app. The compress and split workflows themselves do not require any cloud service.

Why uploading sensitive files to online converters is a problem → How offline conversion actually works → FileHop for lawyers — the full workflow set →

FAQs

What is the maximum PDF size for CM/ECF? ▼

There is no single PACER-wide maximum. Each federal court sets its own per-document PDF size limit, ranging from roughly 3 MB (some bankruptcy districts) to 200 MB (U.S. Court of Federal Claims). Most federal district courts land between 35 MB and 50 MB. See the per-court table above.

How do I find my specific court's PDF size limit? ▼

Three ways. First, the table above covers the high-traffic federal districts plus a sample of bankruptcy and appellate courts. Second, click through to your court's own CM/ECF FAQ page (linked in the Source column of every row). Third, for any court not in our table, use the PACER Court CM/ECF Lookup tool — it covers all 94 federal districts plus bankruptcy and appellate.

Why does my court have a 35 MB limit when the court next door allows 50 MB? ▼

Each federal court runs its own CM/ECF server and chooses its own size cap based on infrastructure capacity and local-rule preferences. Courts upgrade infrastructure on different schedules and bump their caps independently — there is no national coordinating body for size limits. The Central District of California raised its limit to 35 MB years before some neighboring districts; the Court of Federal Claims allows 200 MB because its caseload is structurally different.

What is the lowest PDF size limit in federal court? ▼

The District of Massachusetts caps individual PDFs at 2 MB — the lowest cap among major federal district courts. Several bankruptcy districts cap at 7–10 MB. If you are filing in any of these, plan to compress aggressively, split where the rule allows, and scan text-only pages at black-and-white 300 DPI rather than color.

What is the highest PDF size limit in federal court? ▼

The U.S. Court of Federal Claims allows PDFs up to 200 MB — currently the federal high-water mark. W.D. Washington allows 75 MB. Most federal districts land between 35 MB and 50 MB, so you generally cannot rely on the high cap unless you are filing in one of the named courts above.

Do bankruptcy courts have different PDF size limits than district courts? ▼

Yes, and bankruptcy courts generally skew lower. Bankruptcy districts often cap at 10–35 MB versus 35–50 MB for district courts. The District of Delaware bankruptcy court raised its limit from 7 MB to 10 MB; the Northern District of Alabama bankruptcy court caps at 35 MB; the District of Wyoming caps at 15 MB. Always check your specific bankruptcy district's CM/ECF FAQ — the variation is wider than for district courts.

How do appellate courts handle oversize PDFs? ▼

Appellate circuit courts (1st through D.C. Circuit, plus the Federal Circuit) each publish their own electronic filing procedures and tend to route oversize briefs through alternative submission channels (e-mail to the clerk, a separate upload link) rather than reject outright. The 9th Circuit publishes a Technical Guide for PDF Documents that also covers required bookmarks; the Federal Circuit's Electronic Filing Procedures document covers the size-limit handoff. Check the circuit's rules before filing.

What is the difference between technical limit and practical limit? ▼

Some courts publish a technical limit (the maximum the CM/ECF server will accept before rejecting the upload) and a separate practical limit (the maximum the local rule recommends). Northern District of California is the cleanest example: 50 MB technical limit, but anything over 30 MB triggers the alternative-submission path under Civil Local Rule 5-1(g)(4). When a court has a practical cap below the technical cap, follow the practical cap.

How do I compress a PDF to fit my court's limit? ▼

Use FileHop (PDF → Compress, with 'Remove metadata' enabled), Adobe Acrobat Pro, Power PDF, or any desktop PDF editor with a compression option. Pick a quality tier — for scan-heavy filings, medium quality typically delivers 60–80% size reduction without readability loss. If compression alone cannot get the file under the limit, split the file into volumes using PDF → Split. The full walkthrough is in 'What to do when your PDF is over the limit' above. FileHop's compression is quality-tiered, not size-targeted — choose a tier, check the result, re-run if you missed.

Will compressing the PDF affect the OCR text layer or bookmarks? ▼

Done correctly, no. A good compress operation preserves the OCR text layer and the document outline (bookmarks) — it reduces size by re-encoding images, downsampling embedded resources, and stripping metadata, not by touching the text layer. If your compressor strips bookmarks or OCR, switch tools. FileHop's Compress preserves both.

What if my brief is over the limit and the court does not allow splitting? ▼

Three options. First, scan text-only pages at black-and-white 300 DPI (not color, not grayscale) — this is often a ten-times size reduction at the source. Second, if the size is driven by photographic exhibits, downsample images to 200–300 DPI; most courts do not require 600 DPI photo fidelity. Third, contact the clerk's office before the filing deadline — many courts have a documented alternative-submission process (CAND, 9th Circuit, Federal Circuit) for oversize filings that cannot be split.

Sources

Authoritative pages used to verify the limits and rules above. Citations are not endorsements; they are authority-pointers.

Before you file

Confirm your court's current limit against its own CM/ECF FAQ before every filing — courts upgrade infrastructure quietly. If your file is over, compress with metadata stripped, split as a fallback, and contact the clerk's office before the deadline if neither option works. If you are filing exhibits along with the brief, see the sibling guide on combining PDF exhibits for court filing.

Download FileHop (Mac + Windows) Combine PDF exhibits for court filing