aws / aws/aws-lambda-roadmap

[Lambda][Node.js] Pointer compression / memory-optimized runtime option for large bundles and source maps

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Description

Hi Lambda team,

We hit a practical memory wall with Node.js Lambda and wanted to ask if pointer compression (or an equivalent runtime-level memory optimization) is on the roadmap for managed Node runtimes.

Our use case is a backend Lambda with a single-file minified bundle. Normal artifact size is ~7.6 MB. If we enable source maps for debugging (`NODE_OPTIONS=--enable-source-maps`), artifact size jumps to ~31.7 MB (`index.mjs` + `index.mjs.map`).

What we observed in real traffic tests:
- Runtime: Node.js 24.x
- Arch: arm64
- Memory: 256 MB
- Without source maps: cold starts are acceptable for our use case
- With source maps enabled: cold start increases, and we started seeing `Runtime.OutOfMemory` at 256 MB in the editor/debug environment

We can work around this by disabling source maps or increasing memory, but this is a tough tradeoff:
- disabling source maps hurts debuggability
- increasing memory increases cost for workloads that are otherwise lightweight

Request:
Could Lambda provide either:
1. managed Node runtimes with V8 pointer compression enabled, or
2. another runtime-level memory optimization path for Node workloads with large bundles/maps?

Even an experimental/runtime flag path would already help for debugging-heavy environments.

Thanks for considering this.

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