Jekyll recursive include causing "Nesting too deep" error when rendering nested comments

Question

I'm working on a Jekyll site and encountering a "Nesting too deep" error when trying to render nested comments using a recursive include. Here's a simplified version of my template:

{% comment %}
  Filename: comment.liquid
  Comment template - displays a single comment and its nested replies
{% endcomment %}

<div class="px-0 text-sm">
  <div class="mb-1">
    <a href="#" class="text-text-muted no-underline text-sm leading-none inline-block pt-0.5 hover:text-link-hover">▲</a>
    <small class="text-text-muted ml-2 text-sm">@{{ comment.author }}</small>
    <small class="text-text-muted ml-2 text-sm">{{ comment.date | date: "%b %d, %Y" }} | <a href="#" class="ml-2 text-xs text-primary hover:underline">parent</a> | <a href="#" class="ml-2 text-xs text-primary hover:underline">next</a></small>
  </div>
  <div>
    <p>{{ comment.content }}</p>
    <small class="text-right underline text-xs cursor-pointer mt-1 inline-block">reply</small>
  </div>

  {% assign replies = site.comments | where: "parent", comment.slug | sort: "date" %}
  <div>comment_slug: {{ comment.slug }}</div>

  {% for reply in replies %}
    <div class="ml-2 mt-4 border-l-2 border-gray-200 pl-2 text-sm md:pl-4">
      <div>parent: {{ reply.parent }}</div>
      <div>slug: {{ reply.slug }}</div>
      <div>content: {{ reply.content }}</div>
      <!-- Error occurs here -->
      {% include comment.liquid comment=reply %}
    </div>
  {% endfor %}
</div>

The comments are stored in _comments/, and the structure looks something like this:

_comments/
├── comment1.md
├── comment1_reply1.md
├── comment2.md
├── comment3.md
├── comment4.md
├── comment4_reply1.md
├── comment4_reply1_reply1.md
├── comment4_reply1_reply1_reply1.md
├── comment4_reply1_reply1_reply1_reply1.md
├── comment4_reply1_reply1_reply1_reply1_reply1.md
└── comment4_reply1_reply1_reply1_reply1_reply1_reply1.md

Each comment can have a parent field linking to another comment's slug, but the replies go several levels deep (up to 6–7 layers).

Problem:
When rendering a post that includes deeply nested comments, Jekyll throws an error:

Nesting too deep - included in /_layouts/post.liquid

Questions:

Why is this happening, even if the data structure looks normal?
Is there a way to avoid or fix the "nesting too deep" error?
Would a different approach to rendering nested comments in Jekyll (without hitting this recursion limit) be better?

nntrn · Accepted Answer · 2025-05-30 23:03:21Z

1

Are you sure the data structure is fine? Have you confirmed with {{site|jsonify}}?

I would have assumed, without plugins, your tree would look more like: comment4/reply1/reply1/reply1/reply1/reply1/index.md

_comments
└── comment4
    ├── index.md
    └── reply1
        ├── index.md
        └── reply1
            ├── index.md
            └── reply1
            ...

answered May 30 at 23:03

nntrn

7273 silver badges11 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

Jekyll recursive include causing "Nesting too deep" error when rendering nested comments

1 Answer 1

Comments

Your Answer

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

1 Answer 1

Comments

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Related