cli/cli · error

cannot open in browser: maximum URL length exceeded

Error message

cannot open in browser: maximum URL length exceeded

What it means

Thrown by gh issue create --web when the preview URL built from the provided title/body/metadata exceeds prShared.ValidURL's maximum length. Browsers and the Browse call cannot reliably handle arbitrarily long URLs, so gh refuses instead of opening a broken page.

Source

Thrown at pkg/cmd/issue/create/create.go:234

	if opts.RecoverFile != "" {
		err = prShared.FillFromJSON(opts.IO, opts.RecoverFile, &tb)
		if err != nil {
			err = fmt.Errorf("failed to recover input: %w", err)
			return
		}
	}

	tpl := prShared.NewTemplateManager(httpClient, baseRepo, opts.Prompter, opts.RootDirOverride, !opts.HasRepoOverride, false)

	if opts.WebMode {
		var openURL string
		if opts.Title != "" || opts.Body != "" || tb.HasMetadata() {
			openURL, err = generatePreviewURL(apiClient, baseRepo, tb, projectsV1Support)
			if err != nil {
				return
			}
			if !prShared.ValidURL(openURL) {
				err = fmt.Errorf("cannot open in browser: maximum URL length exceeded")
				return
			}
		} else if ok, _ := tpl.HasTemplates(); ok {
			openURL = ghrepo.GenerateRepoURL(baseRepo, "issues/new/choose")
		} else {
			openURL = ghrepo.GenerateRepoURL(baseRepo, "issues/new")
		}
		if isTerminal {
			fmt.Fprintf(opts.IO.ErrOut, "Opening %s in your browser.\n", text.DisplayURL(openURL))
		}
		return opts.Browser.Browse(openURL)
	}

	if isTerminal {
		fmt.Fprintf(opts.IO.ErrOut, "\nCreating issue in %s\n\n", ghrepo.FullName(baseRepo))
	}

	repo, err := api.IssueRepoInfo(apiClient, baseRepo)

View on GitHub (pinned to 0eeec0b92e)

Solutions

1. Shorten the body or reference an attached file instead of inlining it.
2. Drop --web and create the issue directly: `gh issue create --title ... --body-file ...` (no URL length limit applies).
3. If a browser flow is required, create with a short placeholder body, then edit the issue on github.com and paste the long content there.

Example fix

# before
gh issue create --web --title "crash" --body "$(cat 5mb.log)"
# gh: cannot open in browser: maximum URL length exceeded

# after
gh issue create --title "crash" --body-file 5mb.log

// Keep the body under the URL budget when using --web:
const maxURLLen = 8219 // prShared.ValidURL bound
func fitsWebURL(title, body string, metaLen int) bool {
	// URL-encoding roughly triples worst-case payloads; use a conservative check
	return len(title)+len(body)+metaLen < maxURLLen/3
}

func validURL(u string) bool {
	return len(u) < 8219
}

if err := createRun(opts); err != nil {
	if err.Error() == "cannot open in browser: maximum URL length exceeded" {
		// retry without --web: create directly with --title/--body-file
	}
}

When it happens

Trigger: `gh issue create --web` with a very large --body (e.g. contents of a huge log pasted or `--body-file` of a large file) plus title/labels; generatePreviewURL encodes everything into query parameters and the result crosses the limit.

Common situations: Piping whole log files into --body, using --web with machine-generated diagnostics, or reusing a command line that worked until the body grew past the threshold.

Related errors

• not a valid agent session URL
• `--template` is not supported when using `--body` or `--body
• already locked
• issue was not found but GraphQL reported no error
• failed to recover input: %w

AI-assisted analysis of cli/cli@0eeec0b92e (2026-08-15). Data as JSON: /api/errors/aaa6c1ee1452a565. Report an issue: GitHub.