SharePoint Online: Find All Large Lists and Generate Report using PowerShell

SharePoint Online uses the hard limit of 5000 items as its list view threshold. So, we need to keep an eye on large lists in our SharePoint Online environment. This may be a nearly impossible task if you do it manually when you have a lot of sites in your tenant. In this blog post, we will show you how to find all the large lists in your environment with PowerShell quickly and easily.

powershell to find large lists in sharepoint online

PowerShell Script to find all large lists in SharePoint Online:

Here is the PowerShell script to scan and get all lists exceeding the 5000 items limit on the given SharePoint Online site collection.

#Load SharePoint CSOM Assemblies
Add-Type -Path "C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web Server Extensions\16\ISAPI\Microsoft.SharePoint.Client.dll"
Add-Type -Path "C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web Server Extensions\16\ISAPI\Microsoft.SharePoint.Client.Runtime.dll"

#Config Parameters
$SiteURL="https://crescent.sharepoint.com"
$ReportOutput="C:\temp\LargeLists.csv"
$Threshold=5000

#Exclude system lists
$ExcludedLists = @("App Packages","appdata","appfiles","Apps in Testing","Cache Profiles","Composed Looks","Content and Structure Reports","Content type publishing error log","Converted Forms",
 "Device Channels","Form Templates","fpdatasources","Get started with Apps for Office and SharePoint","List Template Gallery", "Long Running Operation Status","Maintenance Log Library"
 ,"Master Docs","Master Page Gallery","MicroFeed","NintexFormXml","Quick Deploy Items","Relationships List","Reusable Content","Search Config List", "Solution Gallery",
 "Suggested Content Browser Locations","TaxonomyHiddenList","User Information List","Web Part Gallery","wfpub","wfsvc","Workflow History","Workflow Tasks")

#Delete the Output Report, if exists
if (Test-Path $ReportOutput) {  Remove-Item $ReportOutput }

#Setup Credentials
$Cred= Get-Credential
$Credentials = New-Object Microsoft.SharePoint.Client.SharePointOnlineCredentials($Cred.Username, $Cred.Password)

Function Get-SPOLargeLists($SiteURL)
{
    Write-host "Processing Web:"$SiteURL
    Try {
            #Setup the context
            $Ctx = New-Object Microsoft.SharePoint.Client.ClientContext($SiteURL)
            $Ctx.Credentials = $Credentials

            #Get the web from given URL and its subsites
            $Web = $Ctx.web
            $Ctx.Load($Web)
            $Ctx.Load($web.Webs)
            $Ctx.executeQuery()

            #Get all lists from the web
            $Lists = $Ctx.Web.Lists
            $Ctx.Load($Lists)
            $Ctx.ExecuteQuery()

            $LargeListsResult = @()
            #Loop through each list and get items count
            Foreach($List in $Lists)
                {
                    if($ExcludedLists -NotContains $List.Title) #Exclude certain Lists
                       {
                        if($List.ItemCount -gt $Threshold)
                              {
                                #Get the Result to a psobject
                                $Result = New-Object PSObject
                                $Result | Add-Member NoteProperty Title($List.Title)
                                $Result | Add-Member NoteProperty URL($web.URL)
                                $Result | Add-Member NoteProperty Count($List.ItemCount)
                    
                                #Add the result to an Array
                                $LargeListsResult += $Result

                                Write-host "Found List '$($List.Title)' with $($List.ItemCount) Items" -f Yellow
                                }
                        }
                }

                #Export the result Array to CSV file
                $LargeListsResult | Export-CSV $ReportOutput -NoTypeInformation -Append

                #Iterate through each subsite of the current web and call the function recursively
                foreach ($Subweb in $web.Webs)
                {
                    #Call the function recursively to process all subsites underneaththe current web
                    Get-SPOLargeLists($Subweb.url)
                }
    }
    Catch {
        write-host -f Red "Error Finding Large Lists!" $_.Exception.Message
    }
}

#Call the function with Root site URL
Get-SPOLargeLists -SiteURL $SiteURL 

How do you find large lists in all site collections in the tenant?

PnP PowerShell to Find Larger Lists in All Site Collections

Let’s audit all site collections in the tenant for large lists and generate a report using PnP PowerShell.

#Parameters
$TenantAdminURL = "https://crescent-admin.sharepoint.com"
$CSVFile = "C:\Temp\LargeLists.csv"
$Threshold = 5000
$LargeListsInventory = @()
 
#Function to Audit Larger lists
Function Find-PnPLargeLists($Web)
{
    Write-host "Auditing Site:"$Web.Url
     
    #Get All Lists from the Web
    $Lists= Get-PnPProperty -ClientObject $Web -Property Lists
    $Lists | ForEach-Object {
        If($_.ItemCount -gt $Threshold)
        {
            Write-host -f Yellow "`tFound a Larger list '$($_.Title)' with Items:"$_.ItemCount
 
            $LargeListsInventory += New-Object -TypeName PSObject -Property @{
                SiteURL = $Web.Url
                ListName = $_.Title
                ItemCount = $_.ItemCount
                LastModified = $_.LastItemUserModifiedDate
            }
        }
    }
    #Export Data to CSV File
    $LargeListsInventory | Export-Csv $CSVFile -NoTypeInformation -Append
}
$Cred = Get-credential
#Connect to Tenant Admin Site
Connect-PnPOnline -url $TenantAdminURL -credential $Cred
 
#Delete the CSVFile if exists 
If (Test-Path $CSVFile) { Remove-Item $CSVFile }
 
#Get All Site collections and Iterate through
$SiteCollections = Get-PnPTenantSite
ForEach($Site in $SiteCollections)
{
    #Connect to Site Collection
    Connect-PnPOnline -url $Site.URL -credential $Cred
 
    #Get webs of the Site Collection
    $Webs = Get-PnPSubWeb -Recurse -IncludeRootWeb
 
    #Get All Webs of the site collection and call the function to find large lists
    $Webs | ForEach-Object {Find-PnPLargeLists -Web $_}
}

The output of the script:

sharepoint online pnp powershell to find large lists

Here is another post for on-premises: Find Large Lists in SharePoint using PowerShell

Salaudeen Rajack

Salaudeen Rajack - SharePoint Expert with Two decades of SharePoint Experience. Love to Share my knowledge and experience with the SharePoint community, through real-time articles!

3 thoughts on “SharePoint Online: Find All Large Lists and Generate Report using PowerShell

  • Export to the CSV File is not working. Can you assist on getting the export please.

    Reply
  • How do I get all large lists for all site collections?

    Reply

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