vercel/next.js · critical

Manifest file is empty

Error message

Manifest file is empty

What it means

Thrown by evalManifest when a manifest file read from the build output exists but has zero bytes (content.length === 0). Manifests are generated during build; an empty one means the build artifact is corrupt, truncated, or was wiped mid-write.

Source

Thrown at packages/next/src/server/load-manifest.external.ts:118

  if (shouldCache && cache.has(path)) {
    return cache.get(path) as T
  }

  let content: any
  if (handleMissing) {
    try {
      content = readFileSync(/* turbopackIgnore: true */ path, 'utf8')
    } catch (err) {
      let result = undefined
      cache.set(path, result)
      return result
    }
  } else {
    content = readFileSync(/* turbopackIgnore: true */ path, 'utf8')
  }

  if (content.length === 0) {
    throw new Error('Manifest file is empty')
  }

  let contextObject = {
    process: { env: { NEXT_DEPLOYMENT_ID: process.env.NEXT_DEPLOYMENT_ID } },
  }
  runInNewContext(content, contextObject)

  // Freeze the context object so it cannot be modified if we're caching it.
  if (shouldCache) {
    contextObject = deepFreeze(contextObject)
  }

  if (shouldCache) {
    cache.set(path, contextObject)
  }

  return contextObject as T
}

View on GitHub (pinned to 0ae8c72462)

Solutions

1. Re-run `next build` cleanly to regenerate all manifests.
2. Delete the distDir (.next) entirely before rebuilding to remove any corrupt/empty files.
3. Ensure the build completes without being killed (check CI timeouts / OOM kills).
4. Verify the deployed .next directory is complete and not truncated during copy.

Example fix

# before: corrupt/empty manifest from an interrupted build
rm -rf .next && next build  # rebuild was interrupted

# after: clean and complete rebuild
rm -rf .next && next build && next start

import fs from 'fs'
function assertManifestValid(path: string): void {
  const stat = fs.statSync(path)
  if (stat.size === 0) throw new Error(`Manifest ${path} is empty; rebuild`)
}

import fs from 'fs'
function isManifestNonEmpty(path: string): boolean {
  return fs.existsSync(path) && fs.statSync(path).size > 0
}

null

When it happens

Trigger: The server tries to load a manifest (e.g. routes-manifest, _buildManifest, react-loadable-manifest) from distDir and the file is present but 0 bytes. readFileSync succeeds but returns an empty string.

Common situations: A build was interrupted/killed leaving a partially written manifest, a deploy that copied an incomplete .next, concurrent processes writing to the same distDir, or disk full during build.

Related errors

• Failed to deploy project ${linkRes.stdout} ${linkRes.stderr}
• Invalid fallback option: ${fallbackField}. Fallback option m
• Could not find a production build in the '${opts.config.dist
• Could not find a production build in the '${this.distDir}' d
• Command failed: ${command} ${args.join(' ')} (exit ${code})

AI-assisted analysis of vercel/next.js@0ae8c72462 (2026-08-06). Data as JSON: /api/errors/a5e86f847c7eb28c. Report an issue: GitHub.