Question: I have a Linux web server with JRE and has got problems trying to run a Java APP from the shell. It seems that web server limits the memory I can allocate. Error messages: Error occurred during initialization of VM Could not reserve enough space for object heap Shell code: java -Xmx1950m -cp helloworld.jar What’s wrong? Any ideas? Answer: Some possible reasons: 1) This error means there is not enough memory allocated to the Java Virtual Machine (JVM) 2) The user limits are set too low in /etc/security/limits.conf or /etc/profile/.bash_profile in Linux 3) The allocated memory heap to the JVM is greater than 1.5GB and the OS is only 32 bit. Our natural reaction is “it must be a JVM heap size issue, when the max size is too small“, and we usually start to increase the memory allocation. It may be a totally wrong direction… Try to lower the memory demand to the value you really need to run your app: Why? The memory, JVM allocates to your application, affects the number of threads that can be allocated to your application, so hence the error. This formula gives a decent estimate for the number of threads you can create: (MaxProcessMemory – JVMMemory – ReservedOsMemory) / (ThreadStackSize) = Number of threads Do not set high JVM memory (such as -Xmx1950m) value just because you want to be sure to get enough allocated memory. The JVM will not be able to run threads.