Applies to: All plans.
Before you start: You need access to your cPanel for the hosting account. Log in by single sign-on from your client area -> Services -> My Services (open the service, then Log in to cPanel), or go directly to https://yourdomain/cpanel.
Your disk usage is how much storage your files, databases and backups take up, and it is capped by your plan. Your file count — often called inodes, where every file and folder counts as one — is a different thing entirely: we do not cap the number of files on your account. Keeping the count sensible is still good practice, because a tidy account backs up and migrates far faster. This article shows you how to check your disk usage in cPanel, what to do if you are close to your storage limit, and how to keep your file count under control.
Check your disk usage
- Log in to cPanel.
- In the left sidebar, find the General Information / statistics panel. It shows Disk Usage as a figure (for example, used out of your plan allowance).
- For a full breakdown, open cPanel -> Files -> Disk Usage. This lists your top-level folders and how much each one is using, so you can see whether your space is going to your website files, databases or anything else.
Result: You can see your total disk usage and which folders are taking the most space.
Your file count (inodes)
Other hosts often cap how many files an account may hold. We do not: there is no file-count (inode) limit on any Maxinodes plan, so nothing is blocked or suspended for having a lot of files, and cPanel does not display a file-count figure to check against. Your storage limit is disk space alone.
File count still matters in practice — every file has to be walked individually during a backup, a restore or a migration, so an account carrying hundreds of thousands of stray cache files is slow to back up and slow to move. To see where your files are concentrated, open cPanel -> Files -> File Manager and browse the folders. Caches, logs, old backups and large media libraries are the usual culprits.
Common sources of very large file counts:
- Thousands of small cache or session files (some plugins generate these).
- Old log files that never get cleared.
- Full account backups stored in your home directory — download these and remove them from the account.
- Large numbers of small images or uploads.
Your per-plan disk space
Disk space is the storage limit your plan sets, and it is enforced — cPanel shows your usage against it.
| Plan | Disk space |
|---|---|
| Self-Managed Lite | 10 GB |
| Self-Managed Plus | 50 GB |
| Self-Managed Pro | 100 GB |
| Managed Starter | 40 GB |
| Managed Growth | 80 GB |
| Managed Business | 200 GB |
| Managed Enterprise | 1 TB+ |
On Self-Managed you can also add extra disk +25 GB for EUR 4/mo as a configurable option in the client area.
What to do if you are close to your disk limit
- Free up space: clear caches and old logs, remove account backups from the home directory (download them first), and delete unused installs.
- Optimise: trim large media you no longer need; some caching plugins let you cap how many files they keep.
- Upgrade: if you genuinely need more space, move to a larger plan from client area -> Services -> My Services.
Note on email: Maxinodes does not host mailboxes on the cPanel server, so mailbox storage never counts against your cPanel disk usage. Email is Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace and is managed in its own admin console.
Troubleshooting this task
- The figure looks wrong or hasn't updated: cPanel recalculates usage periodically rather than instantly, so give it a little time after you delete files.
- You can't find a File Usage or Inodes figure in cPanel: that display is switched off on our servers, because there is no file-count limit to check against. Disk Usage is the figure that matters.
- Disk usage is fine but the account has a huge number of files: nothing will break — there is no file-count limit — but clearing caches, logs and old backups will make your backups and any future migration noticeably quicker.
- You can't find a big folder using space: use cPanel -> Files -> Disk Usage to drill down folder by folder.
Comments
0 comments
Please sign in to leave a comment.