aarch64 - netlink: Error: Could not process rule: No buffer space available

Steven Haigh
2026-03-03T23:44:59Z

Hi all,

Firstly, please CC me in replies as I'm not subscribed to the list.

I am currently loading some named sets into nftables using the following
configuration:

set au-ipv4 {
type ipv4_addr
flags interval
auto-merge
elements = { $AU.ipv4 }
}

set au-ipv6 {
type ipv6_addr
flags interval
auto-merge
elements = { $AU.ipv6 }
}

These sets are loaded in the config via:
include "/etc/nftables/firewall/geo-nft/countrysets/AU.ipv4";
include "/etc/nftables/firewall/geo-nft/countrysets/AU.ipv6";

The files are created using the geo-nft.sh script here:
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/wirefalls/geo-nft/main/geo-nft.sh

When loading these, I get the following fatal error:
netlink: Error: Could not process rule: No buffer space available

This only seems to happen on the aarch64 installs. The same kernel
version + tools version on x86_64 architecture seems to load just fine.

$ cat /proc/version
Linux version 6.18.15-200.fc43.aarch64
(mockbuild@835a9c7eeabc46d3b99996c22f20c9cf) (gcc (GCC) 15.2.1 20260123
(Red Hat 15.2.1-7), GNU ld version 2.45.1-4.fc43) #1 SMP PREEMPT_DYNAMIC
Fri Feb 27 22:55:30 UTC 2026

$ nft --version
nftables v1.1.3 (Commodore Bullmoose #4)

I've had no success in hunting for why this would be the case.

I've found that I can batch-load the sets in ~500 rules at a time, and
the entire set will load - but including them at the nftables service
level always fails.

How should I fix this?

--
Steven Haigh

📧 netwiz@crc.id.au
💻 https://crc.id.au