[Support]: Nginx "proxy_busy_buffers_size" must be less than the size of all "proxy_buffers" minus one buffer.

[SikinoGaming]

Describe the problem you are having

I have a QNAP NAS with an ARM® Cortex®-A57 processor and when I start a fresh installation of Frigate (via your command line or a composition file) I have the same error.
I tried many modifications in this file by saving it to my server and adding a volume that points to this file and then modifying it with different quantities given my internet and AI, but this error did not kept happening. I also tried older versions but the error was still there.

Version

0.17.0-0.14.0

What browser(s) are you using?

Brave 1.88.138 (Chromium 146.0.7680.178)

Frigate config file

mqtt:
  enabled: false

cameras:
  dummy_camera: # <--- this will be changed to your actual camera later
    enabled: false
    ffmpeg:
      inputs:
        - path: rtsp://127.0.0.1:554/rtsp
          roles:
            - detect
detect:
  enabled: true
version: 0.17-0

Relevant Frigate log output

nginx: [emerg] "proxy_busy_buffers_size" must be less than the size of all "proxy_buffers" minus one buffer in /usr/local/nginx/conf/nginx.conf:365

Relevant go2rtc log output

/

FFprobe output from your camera

/

Frigate stats

No response

Install method

Docker Compose

docker-compose file or Docker CLI command

version: "3.9"

services:
  frigate:
    container_name: sauron
    image: ghcr.io/blakeblackshear/frigate:stable-standard-arm64
    restart: unless-stopped
    stop_grace_period: 30s
    privileged: false 
    shm_size: "512mb"
    tty: true
    working_dir: /opt/frigate
    volumes:
      - /etc/localtime:/etc/localtime:ro
      - /valid/path/to/Frigate/config:/config
      - /valid/path/to/media:/media/frigate
      - type: tmpfs
        target: /tmp/cache
        tmpfs:
          size: 1000000000
    ports:
      - "3443:8971"
      - "380:5000"
      - "8554:8554"
      - "8555:8555/tcp"
      - "8555:8555/udp"
    environment:
      FRIGATE_RTSP_PASSWORD: "password"
      TZ: "Europe/Paris"
    labels:
      - "com.qnap.qcs.network.mode=nat"
      - "com.qnap.qcs.gpu=False"

Object Detector

CPU (no coral)

Network connection

Wired

Camera make and model

/

Screenshots of the Frigate UI's System metrics pages

No response

Any other information that may be helpful

I found other issues with this error but they don't have a fixed mention, so I'll try my luck for QNAP users.

[inkeep-ai-assistant[bot]]

This NGINX error occurs when Frigate's internal NGINX configuration has incompatible buffer settings for your ARM64 environment. The error indicates that proxy_busy_buffers_size exceeds the allowed limit based on proxy_buffers. (1), (2)

Solution: Override the NGINX Configuration

You can customize Frigate's internal network configuration by bind mounting a modified nginx.conf into the container. (3)

Add this volume to your docker-compose file:

volumes:
  - /path/to/your/nginx.conf:/usr/local/nginx/conf/nginx.conf

(3)

To create a working configuration:

1. Start a temporary container to extract the default nginx.conf:

   docker run --rm -it ghcr.io/blakeblackshear/frigate:stable-standard-arm64 cat /usr/local/nginx/conf/nginx.conf > nginx.conf

2. Edit the extracted file and locate the proxy buffer directives around line 365. Adjust the values so that proxy_busy_buffers_size is less than the total size of all proxy_buffers minus one buffer. For example, if you have:

   • proxy_buffers 8 32k (total = 256k)
   • Then proxy_busy_buffers_size must be less than 224k (256k minus one 32k buffer)

3. Mount the modified file as shown above and restart the container.

This is a known issue affecting some QNAP NAS and ARM64 deployments. (1), (2)

📚 Sources:

1. [Support]: Having trouble starting docker image on Qnap NAS with nginx error proxy_busy_buffers_size
2. nginx: [emerg] "proxy_busy_buffers_size" must be less than the size of all "proxy_buffers" minus one buffer in /usr/local/nginx/conf/nginx.conf:336
3. Advanced Options

---

Have another question? Just tag @inkeep.

[SikinoGaming]

@inkeep I now have an other error on top of the old one :
``2026-04-06 11:02:24.029991037 [INFO] Starting NGINX...

sed: cannot rename /usr/local/nginx/conf/sedZC73WT: Device or resource busy

2026-04-06 11:02:25.197299348 nginx: [emerg] "proxy_busy_buffers_size" must be equal to or greater than the maximum of the value of "proxy_buffer_size" and one of the "proxy_buffers" in /usr/local/nginx/conf/nginx.conf:309

2026-04-06 11:02:25.214001966 [INFO] Service NGINX exited with code 1 (by signal 0)``

[inkeep-ai-assistant[bot]]

You're seeing two issues:

1. "Device or resource busy" error

The sed: cannot rename error occurs because you're bind mounting the nginx.conf file directly, and Frigate's startup scripts are trying to modify it in place. When you mount a single file (rather than a directory), the container cannot rename/replace it.

2. Updated NGINX buffer error

The new error message is the inverse of the original—now proxy_busy_buffers_size is too small rather than too large. The value must be:

• Greater than or equal to proxy_buffer_size
• Greater than or equal to one of the proxy_buffers size values
• Less than the total of all proxy_buffers minus one buffer

Solution:

Instead of mounting the file directly, mount the entire nginx conf directory or copy the file to a location the container can modify. Try this approach:

1. Create a directory for nginx config:

   mkdir -p /path/to/nginx-conf

2. Extract and place the config there:

   docker run --rm ghcr.io/blakeblackshear/frigate:stable-standard-arm64 cat /usr/local/nginx/conf/nginx.conf > /path/to/nginx-conf/nginx.conf

3. Edit the buffer values to satisfy all constraints. For example:

   • proxy_buffer_size 16k;
   • proxy_buffers 8 32k;
   • proxy_busy_buffers_size 64k;

   This works because: 64k ≥ 32k (one buffer), 64k ≥ 16k (buffer_size), and 64k < 224k (256k total minus one 32k buffer).

4. Mount the directory instead of the file in your docker-compose:

   volumes:
     - /path/to/nginx-conf:/usr/local/nginx/conf

(1)

Note: You may need to copy additional files from /usr/local/nginx/conf/ if the directory contains other required configuration files.

📚 Sources:

1. Advanced Options

---

Have another question? Just tag @inkeep.