0

Question

For our business requirements we have 700+ content types and 400 site collections. If I use a content type hub will I be exceeding any recommended or hard limit?

Some Background

These are legitimately required CTs that have been defined by our records department for different ECM purposes so the number isn't going to get any smaller.

I only need to use some CTs in some site collections. E.g.:

  • SC 1

    • CT 1
    • CT 2
  • SC 2

    • CT 2
    • CT 3
  • SC 3

    • CT 1
    • CT 3
  • SC 4

    • None

Ideally I would have liked to enable specific site collections to subscribe to specific CTs but since these are staying in one Web App this isn't possible.

4 Answers 4

1

There is no documented limits on number of contenttypes. SharePoint limits are documented in SharePoint Server 2010 capacity management: Software boundaries and limits.

But be aware that it'll take some time for all of the content types to be available when you create new site collections.

But another question is what you expect to get as benefit from putting the content types into the ContentType hub?
If you want your end users to maintain the 700+ contenttype in one place then it's a good idea. But if you're creating/maintaining the Content Types in features in WSP, then in my opinion you don't get any benefit from publishing through the hub.

1
  • Technically our users will be managing these content types in a separate system all together. We just want to import them in one place.
    – RWL01
    Apr 9, 2012 at 19:03
2

One reason to beware of many content types is the impact it has on general site collection creation times.

Each time a new site collection is created, all syndicated content types in connected hubs are copied down to it. So the more content types you have the slower it becomes to create site collections.

In our staging environment, we found that once we had 600 content types creation time per site collection slowed to 15 minutes.

Stats

Thanks to Bryant Gofsky of Softlanding for the stats.

1

There is an Content Type Hub FAQ which addresses the CT Hub construct but the limitation would be based on the list that uses the content type and the number of list columns - SharePoint 2010 Column Limit (based on column type).

2
  • Thanks but I'm looking for numbers on whether or not you can have too many content types in a CT hub given the publishing infrastructure.
    – RWL01
    Apr 9, 2012 at 15:32
  • I think the limitation is with the number of columns in the list (as mentioned in the second link above). There are no (documented) limitations on the number of content types, only how many can be used at a given time (as in list columns). Apr 9, 2012 at 17:06
0

I have seen over 5000 content types in a content type hub before. I'm not saying it was a "good" idea, but it didn't break any SharePoint rules. :-)

Your Answer

By clicking “Post Your Answer”, you agree to our terms of service and acknowledge that you have read and understand our privacy policy and code of conduct.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.