diff --git a/nanochat/gpt.py b/nanochat/gpt.py
index a4e22efe..e7e19550 100644
--- a/nanochat/gpt.py
+++ b/nanochat/gpt.py
@@ -177,39 +177,60 @@ class GPT(nn.Module):
         self.value_embeds = nn.ModuleDict({str(i): nn.Embedding(padded_vocab_size, kv_dim) for i in range(config.n_layer) if has_ve(i, config.n_layer)})
         # To support meta device initialization, we init the rotary embeddings here, but it's just "fake" meta tensors only.
         # Precompute a reasonably large RoPE cache up front (cheap relative to model weights).
-        # The cache is also allowed to grow dynamically in forward() if generation exceeds this length.
+        # The cache may also grow lazily in forward() if generation exceeds this length.
         self.rotary_seq_len = config.sequence_len * 10
+        # Bound lazy growth to avoid unbounded memory usage during very long generation runs.
+        self.max_rotary_seq_len = max(self.rotary_seq_len, config.sequence_len * 64)
+        
         head_dim = config.n_embd // config.n_head
         cos, sin = self._precompute_rotary_embeddings(self.rotary_seq_len, head_dim)
         self.register_buffer("cos", cos, persistent=False) # persistent=False means it's not saved to the checkpoint
         self.register_buffer("sin", sin, persistent=False)
 
-    def _ensure_rope_cache(self, needed_seq_len: int, device: torch.device):
+    def _ensure_rope_cache(self, needed_seq_len: int):
         """
         Ensure rotary embedding cache (cos/sin) is long enough for absolute positions [0, needed_seq_len).
     
         We grow lazily to avoid crashes for long prompts / long KV-cache generation.
         Growth is amortized by rounding up to the next power of two.
+    
+        Growth is bounded by self.max_rotary_seq_len to avoid unbounded memory usage.
         """
         cur_len = self.cos.size(1)
         if needed_seq_len <= cur_len:
             return
     
-        # Next power-of-two >= needed_seq_len
-        new_len = 1 << (needed_seq_len - 1).bit_length()
+        if needed_seq_len > self.max_rotary_seq_len:
+            raise RuntimeError(
+                f"RoPE cache request exceeds max_rotary_seq_len: need {needed_seq_len}, "
+                f"have {cur_len}, cap {self.max_rotary_seq_len}. "
+                "Increase max_rotary_seq_len for longer-context generation."
+            )
+    
+        # Safety: mutating buffers during torch.compile tracing is unsafe.
+        import torch._dynamo
+        if torch._dynamo.is_compiling():
+            raise RuntimeError(
+                f"RoPE cache too small during torch.compile (need {needed_seq_len}, have {cur_len}). "
+                "Increase initial rotary_seq_len/max_rotary_seq_len or avoid compiled generation."
+            )
+    
+        # Next power-of-two >= needed_seq_len (amortized growth), bounded by cap
+        new_len = min(self.max_rotary_seq_len, 1 << (needed_seq_len - 1).bit_length())
     
         head_dim = self.config.n_embd // self.config.n_head
+        device = self.cos.device
         cos, sin = self._precompute_rotary_embeddings(seq_len=new_len, head_dim=head_dim, device=device)
     
         # Preserve dtype/device invariants (precompute already returns bf16, but keep explicit)
         cos = cos.to(dtype=self.cos.dtype, device=device)
         sin = sin.to(dtype=self.sin.dtype, device=device)
     
-        # Overwrite existing registered buffers (keep same names, persistent=False property remains)
+        # Overwrite existing registered buffers (persistent=False remains from initial registration)
         self.cos = cos
         self.sin = sin
         self.rotary_seq_len = new_len
-
+        
     @torch.no_grad()
     def init_weights(self):
         """
@@ -415,7 +436,7 @@ class GPT(nn.Module):
         T0 = 0 if kv_cache is None else kv_cache.get_pos()
     
         # Ensure RoPE buffers cover absolute positions [T0, T0+T)
-        self._ensure_rope_cache(T0 + T, device=idx.device)
+        self._ensure_rope_cache(T0 + T)
     
         assert idx.device == self.cos.device, f"Rotary embeddings and idx are on different devices: {idx.device} != {self.cos.device}"
         assert self.cos.dtype == torch.bfloat16, "Rotary embeddings must be in bfloat16"