?STRING TOO LONG ERROR
Commodore VIC-20
Severity: MinorWhat it means
?STRING TOO LONG ERROR means a string variable exceeded 255 characters.
Commodore BASIC V2 has a hard limit of 255 characters per string.
Split long strings into multiple variables or PRINT them in parts.
Affected Models
- Commodore VIC-20
- Commodore VIC-20CR
- VICE emulator (VIC-20)
Common Causes
- Concatenating strings that together exceed 255 characters
- Building a string inside a loop that grows beyond 255 characters
- Trying to store a very long piece of text in a single variable
How to Fix It
-
Split the string into multiple variables.
Instead of one 300-character string, use A$ for the first 200 characters and B$ for the rest.
PRINT A$;B$ displays them together. -
PRINT parts of the string directly instead of concatenating first.
PRINT "Part one ";"Part two " works without creating a combined string.
This avoids the 255-character limit entirely. -
Check loops that build strings — add a length check.
If A$ grows inside a loop, check LEN(A$) before concatenating more.
If LEN(A$) > 240, start a new string variable.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why is the limit 255 characters?
Commodore BASIC stores the length of each string in a single byte.
A byte can hold values 0 to 255, so that is the maximum string length.
This is the same limit on the C64 and all Commodore 8-bit computers.
Does this limit apply to string constants in PRINT statements?
String constants in quotes are limited by the maximum line length (80 characters on the VIC-20), not the 255-byte string limit.
The 255 limit applies to string variables in memory.