AWS Raises Message Size Limits, but Large Files Still Belong in Storage

AWS raised the maximum message size for SQS to 1 MiB in August 2025 and for EventBridge to 1 MB in most Regions in January 2026. SNS added support for 1 MiB payloads in September 2026 through a new topic attribute, with delivery restricted to SQS, Lambda and Data Firehose. The article argues that the larger limits invite teams to pass files through queues, which raises costs because base64 encoding inflates binary data and billing applies per 64 KB chunk. It also warns that at-least-once delivery, retries and dead-letter queues spread copies of the file into places with uncontrolled retention. The recommended alternative is the claim-check pattern, where the file stays in object storage and the message carries a small reference with a content hash.
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