diff --git a/fs/btrfs/send.c b/fs/btrfs/send.c
index d9e49705a289..edfc7ba38b33 100644
--- a/fs/btrfs/send.c
+++ b/fs/btrfs/send.c
@@ -36,6 +36,14 @@
 #include "transaction.h"
 #include "compression.h"
 
+/*
+ * Maximum number of references an extent can have in order for us to attempt to
+ * issue clone operations instead of write operations. This currently exists to
+ * avoid hitting limitations of the backreference walking code (taking a lot of
+ * time and using too much memory for extents with large number of references).
+ */
+#define SEND_MAX_EXTENT_REFS	64
+
 /*
  * A fs_path is a helper to dynamically build path names with unknown size.
  * It reallocates the internal buffer on demand.
@@ -1327,6 +1335,7 @@ static int find_extent_clone(struct send_ctx *sctx,
 	struct clone_root *cur_clone_root;
 	struct btrfs_key found_key;
 	struct btrfs_path *tmp_path;
+	struct btrfs_extent_item *ei;
 	int compressed;
 	u32 i;
 
@@ -1376,7 +1385,6 @@ static int find_extent_clone(struct send_ctx *sctx,
 	ret = extent_from_logical(fs_info, disk_byte, tmp_path,
 				  &found_key, &flags);
 	up_read(&fs_info->commit_root_sem);
-	btrfs_release_path(tmp_path);
 
 	if (ret < 0)
 		goto out;
@@ -1385,6 +1393,21 @@ static int find_extent_clone(struct send_ctx *sctx,
 		goto out;
 	}
 
+	ei = btrfs_item_ptr(tmp_path->nodes[0], tmp_path->slots[0],
+			    struct btrfs_extent_item);
+	/*
+	 * Backreference walking (iterate_extent_inodes() below) is currently
+	 * too expensive when an extent has a large number of references, both
+	 * in time spent and used memory. So for now just fallback to write
+	 * operations instead of clone operations when an extent has more than
+	 * a certain amount of references.
+	 */
+	if (btrfs_extent_refs(tmp_path->nodes[0], ei) > SEND_MAX_EXTENT_REFS) {
+		ret = -ENOENT;
+		goto out;
+	}
+	btrfs_release_path(tmp_path);
+
 	/*
 	 * Setup the clone roots.
 	 */