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Feature Request: configurable screen buffer size #5048

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opened 2026-01-31 00:03:49 +00:00 by claunia · 4 comments
claunia commented 2026-01-31 00:03:49 +00:00
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Originally created by @ffays on GitHub (Nov 18, 2019).

Description of the new feature

Provide a way to configure the screen buffer size

either

  1. provide a way to configure the number of rows, and possibly columns, for the screen buffer size.
  2. or provide a way to configure the maximum size of the screen buffer as number of bytes.

Note: option 1 will be backward compatible with the original cmd and prowershell consoles, and option 2 provides a better understanding of memory footprint.

Proposed technical implementation details

These settings may be defined in the configuration file Windows Terminal JSON Settings.

e,g,

(option 1)

screenBufferWidth: 160
screenBufferHeight: 100000

Where screenBufferWidth is a number of columns and screenBufferHeight a number of lines.

(option 2)

screenBufferSize 10485760

Where screenBufferSize is a number of bytes (hereby 10MB)

Originally created by @ffays on GitHub (Nov 18, 2019). # Description of the new feature Provide a way to configure the screen buffer size either 1. provide a way to configure the number of rows, and possibly columns, for the screen buffer size. 2. or provide a way to configure the maximum size of the screen buffer as number of bytes. Note: option 1 will be backward compatible with the original cmd and prowershell consoles, and option 2 provides a better understanding of memory footprint. # Proposed technical implementation details These settings may be defined in the configuration file Windows Terminal JSON Settings. e,g, (option 1) ``` screenBufferWidth: 160 screenBufferHeight: 100000 ``` Where screenBufferWidth is a number of columns and screenBufferHeight a number of lines. (option 2) ``` screenBufferSize 10485760 ``` Where screenBufferSize is a number of bytes (hereby 10MB)
claunia added the Issue-FeatureNeeds-Tag-FixResolution-AnsweredProduct-Terminal labels 2026-01-31 00:03:49 +00:00
claunia commented 2026-01-31 00:03:50 +00:00
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@zadjii-msft commented on GitHub (Nov 18, 2019):

You can actually already use historySize to change the size of the scrollback, which combined with the initialRows and initialCols forms the entire size of the "screen buffer" in the terminal.

@zadjii-msft commented on GitHub (Nov 18, 2019): You can actually already use `historySize` to change the size of the scrollback, which combined with the `initialRows` and `initialCols` forms the entire size of the "screen buffer" in the terminal.
claunia commented 2026-01-31 00:03:50 +00:00
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@DHowett-MSFT commented on GitHub (Nov 18, 2019):

Looks like this has been answered. Let us know!

@DHowett-MSFT commented on GitHub (Nov 18, 2019): Looks like this has been answered. Let us know!
claunia commented 2026-01-31 00:03:50 +00:00
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@ffays commented on GitHub (Nov 20, 2019):

Thank you for your answer.

I changed the settings initialRows, initialCols and historySize, and it works as expected.

With as limitation, historySize cannot go beyond 32767 lines ... why such limitation that ages from the 16-bit computer era?

Last words: to my point of view, I believe that "historySize" term is misleading as it can be confounded with command history size...

@ffays commented on GitHub (Nov 20, 2019): Thank you for your answer. I changed the settings initialRows, initialCols and historySize, and it works as expected. With as limitation, historySize cannot go beyond 32767 lines ... why such limitation that ages from the 16-bit computer era? Last words: to my point of view, I believe that "historySize" term is misleading as it can be confounded with command history size...
claunia commented 2026-01-31 00:03:50 +00:00
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@zadjii-msft commented on GitHub (Nov 20, 2019):

So, the historySize is restricted to that because at the time of writing, both the Terminal and the vintage console share the same TextBuffer implementation. Since the vintage console needs to be restricted to SHRT_MAX lines to be able to respond to the Console API correctly, the Terminal is also locked to that size.

This is a limitation we plan on relaxing in the future - we're hoping in a future release to even add support for an "infinite scrollback" (#1410) mode (though it's unlikely to land in 1.0).

@zadjii-msft commented on GitHub (Nov 20, 2019): So, the `historySize` is restricted to that because at the time of writing, both the Terminal and the vintage console share the same TextBuffer implementation. Since the vintage console needs to be restricted to `SHRT_MAX` lines to be able to respond to the Console API correctly, the Terminal is also locked to that size. This is a limitation we plan on relaxing in the future - we're hoping in a future release to even add support for an "infinite scrollback" (#1410) mode (though it's unlikely to land in 1.0).
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Reference: starred/terminal#5048
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