even when I don't get the message about not being able to run the query when i try to compact and repair, or close the database, the database acts like it is compacting, but it doesn't compact.

even when I don't get the error message about the query being to large, the database may act like it is compacting, but it actually doesn't compact

Is your database stored in a directory that is in OneDrive or Google Drive?  I've seen issues when a db is trying to update in either one of those.  See File Sharing

Hi Carolyn, check every one of your queries to see if they return too many rows.  It is not the size of your DB, but the size of the data returned by your query that causes this error.  My picture below shows two tables with 3000 rows each, but because of a missing join, this query will return NINE MILLION rows of data.  So check if you have any missing joins in your queries.  I can't think of any other mishaps that could cause such a dramatic increase in query size.  Is this a recently-occurred phenomenon?  If so, check the queries you have edited recently.