quarkusio/quarkus · error · IllegalArgumentException

Limiting to 0 values is not supported

Error message

Limiting to 0 values is not supported

What it means

PanacheBlockingQueryImpl.limit(int max) rejects max == 0 with IllegalArgumentException because the underlying Hibernate range(0, max-1) call would produce range(0,-1), which is invalid. Limiting a query to zero rows is semantically meaningless in this API, so it fails fast.

Source

Thrown at extensions/data/hibernate/runtime/src/main/java/io/quarkus/data/hibernate/runtime/orm/PanacheBlockingQueryImpl.java:43

    final Limits<BlockingDataQuery<Entity>> limitingDelegate = new Limits<BlockingDataQuery<Entity>>() {
        @Override
        public Limit limit() {
            io.quarkus.panache.common.Range range = delegate.range();
            // convert 0-based range to 1-based Jakarta Data Limit
            return Limit.range(range.getStartIndex() + 1, range.getLastIndex() + 1);
        }

        @Override
        public BlockingDataQuery<Entity> limit(Limit limit) {
            // startAt is 1-based in Jakarta Data, convert to 0-based; end is inclusive, hence -1 on size
            delegate.range((int) (limit.startAt() - 1), (int) (limit.startAt() + limit.maxResults() - 2));
            return PanacheBlockingQueryImpl.this;
        }

        @Override
        public BlockingDataQuery<Entity> limit(int max) {
            if (max == 0) {
                throw new IllegalArgumentException("Limiting to 0 values is not supported");
            }
            // end is inclusive, hence -1 on size
            delegate.range(0, max - 1);
            return PanacheBlockingQueryImpl.this;
        }

        @Override
        public BlockingDataQuery<Entity> limit(long start, int max) {
            // end is inclusive, hence -1 on size
            delegate.range((int) start, (int) (start + max - 1));
            return PanacheBlockingQueryImpl.this;
        }

        @Override
        public BlockingDataQuery<Entity> limitFrom(long start) {
            // end is inclusive, hence -1 on size
            // default page size of Jakarta Data is 10 (see PageRequest)
            delegate.range((int) start, (int) (start + 10 - 1));

View on GitHub (pinned to e1c734241f)

Solutions

1. Guard the caller: only call limit(max) when max > 0
2. Skip pagination entirely (return empty list without querying) when max == 0
3. Clamp to a minimum of 1 if a row must be returned: limit(Math.max(1, max))

Example fix

// before
query.limit(pageSize).list();
// after
if (pageSize <= 0) {
    return Collections.emptyList();
}
query.limit(pageSize).list();

if (max <= 0) {
    return Collections.emptyList(); // or throw a domain-level error
}
query.limit(max);

boolean isValidLimit(Integer max) {
    return max != null && max > 0;
}

try {
    return query.limit(requestedMax).list();
} catch (IllegalArgumentException e) {
    if (e.getMessage().contains("Limiting to 0")) {
        return Collections.emptyList();
    }
    throw e;
}

When it happens

Trigger: Calling query.limit(0) — e.g. computing page size 0, an empty-limit config value, or limit(requestedSize) where requestedSize resolves to 0 (empty page request, size=0 in pagination math).

Common situations: Dynamic pagination where clients send size=0; feature flags or config that zero out limits; code like limit(pageSize) without guarding pageSize.

Related errors

• Limiting to 0 values is not supported
• Limiting to 0 values is not supported
• Page index must be >= 0 :
• Page size must be > 0 :
• Start index must be >= 0:

AI-assisted analysis of quarkusio/quarkus@e1c734241f (2026-09-05). Data as JSON: /api/errors/f030ddeea3694550. Report an issue: GitHub.