Mysql server has gone away

[laradev43]

Hello,

I updated to the latest version of K2 and I'm experiencing some performance issues.

K2 version: v2.14
K2 Items: 75,345
Visitors per day: 30k and regularly more (60k+)
Joomla: Joomla! 3.10.12-2025-01-08-EOLfix Stable [Daraja] 8-July-2023 15:18 GMT
PHP: 7.4.33
MySQL: 5.5.5-10.3.39-MariaDB

I'm using the mod_k2_content module in a position that is displayed on all pages of the site. When the module is activated, the site eventually crashes due to the accumulation of the following queries.

To clarify, I'm not using any template overrides for K2.

Here are the queries (just for example):
| 0.000 | | 16545 | myuser | localhost | mybdd | Killed | 106 | Sending data | /* Frontend / mod_k2_content */ SELECT i.*, c.nameAS categoryname, c.id AS categoryid, c.alias AS categoryalias, c.params AS categoryparams FROM myprefix_k2_items AS i INNER JOIN myprefix_k2_categories AS c ON c.id = i.catid WHERE i.published = 1 AND i.access IN(1,5) AND i.trash = 0 AND c.published = 1 AND c.access IN(1,5) AND c.trash = 0 AND (i.publish_up = '0000-00-00 00:00:00' OR i.publish_up <= '2025-07-31 13:23:01') AND (i.publish_down = '0000-00-00 00:00:00' OR i.publish_down >= '2025-07-31 13:23:01') AND i.created_by IN(780) AND i.created_by_alias = '' ORDER BY i.created DESC LIMIT 0, 5 | 0.000 | | 16547 | myuser | localhost | mybdd | Killed | 104 | Sending data | /* Frontend / mod_k2_content */ SELECT i.*, c.nameAS categoryname, c.id AS categoryid, c.alias AS categoryalias, c.params AS categoryparams FROM myprefix_k2_items AS i INNER JOIN myprefix_k2_categories AS c ON c.id = i.catid WHERE i.published = 1 AND i.access IN(1,5) AND i.trash = 0 AND c.published = 1 AND c.access IN(1,5) AND c.trash = 0 AND (i.publish_up = '0000-00-00 00:00:00' OR i.publish_up <= '2025-07-31 13:23:03') AND (i.publish_down = '0000-00-00 00:00:00' OR i.publish_down >= '2025-07-31 13:23:03') AND i.created_by IN(780) AND i.created_by_alias = '' ORDER BY i.created DESC LIMIT 0, 5 | 0.000 | | 16548 | myuser | localhost | mybdd | Killed | 104 | Sending data | /* Frontend / mod_k2_content */ SELECT i.*, c.nameAS categoryname, c.id AS categoryid, c.alias AS categoryalias, c.params AS categoryparams FROM myprefix_k2_items AS i INNER JOIN myprefix_k2_categories AS c ON c.id = i.catid WHERE i.published = 1 AND i.access IN(1,5) AND i.trash = 0 AND c.published = 1 AND c.access IN(1,5) AND c.trash = 0 AND (i.publish_up = '0000-00-00 00:00:00' OR i.publish_up <= '2025-07-31 13:23:03') AND (i.publish_down = '0000-00-00 00:00:00' OR i.publish_down >= '2025-07-31 13:23:03') AND i.created_by IN(780) AND i.created_by_alias = '' ORDER BY i.created DESC LIMIT 0, 5 | 0.000 | | 16550 | myuser | localhost | mybdd | Killed | 103 | Sending data | /* Frontend / mod_k2_content */ SELECT i.*, c.nameAS categoryname, c.id AS categoryid, c.alias AS categoryalias, c.params AS categoryparams FROM myprefix_k2_items AS i INNER JOIN myprefix_k2_categories AS c ON c.id = i.catid WHERE i.published = 1 AND i.access IN(1,5) AND i.trash = 0 AND c.published = 1 AND c.access IN(1,5) AND c.trash = 0 AND (i.publish_up = '0000-00-00 00:00:00' OR i.publish_up <= '2025-07-31 13:23:03') AND (i.publish_down = '0000-00-00 00:00:00' OR i.publish_down >= '2025-07-31 13:23:03') AND i.created_by IN(780) AND i.created_by_alias = '' ORDER BY i.created DESC LIMIT 0, 5 | 0.000 | | 16551 | myuser | localhost | mybdd | Killed | 102 | Sending data | /* Frontend / mod_k2_content */ SELECT i.*, c.nameAS categoryname, c.id AS categoryid, c.alias AS categoryalias, c.params AS categoryparams FROM myprefix_k2_items AS i INNER JOIN myprefix_k2_categories AS c ON c.id = i.catid WHERE i.published = 1 AND i.access IN(1,5) AND i.trash = 0 AND c.published = 1 AND c.access IN(1,5) AND c.trash = 0 AND (i.publish_up = '0000-00-00 00:00:00' OR i.publish_up <= '2025-07-31 13:23:04') AND (i.publish_down = '0000-00-00 00:00:00' OR i.publish_down >= '2025-07-31 13:23:04') AND i.created_by IN(780) AND i.created_by_alias = '' ORDER BY i.created DESC LIMIT 0, 5

Thank you for you'ere help.

[fevangelou]

This most likely depends on hardware resources, caching (if any and how it's setup) and MariaDB configuration. Is it a shared server, is it a VM/dedicated? In other words, it depends...

We run far more complex K2 Content setups on sites with 100k+ items without a hiccup. You're in the "large" sites segment, so maybe a shared hosting account or very small VM doesn't cut it anymore. You also need to account for increased bot use from AI crawlers etc. which has spiked significantly over the last year or so.