Base OS RAM usage Tahoe vs Golden Gate

[tong_si_nan_pei]

After upgrading from macOS 26 to macOS 27 did anyone notice a difference in base RAM utilisation?

I have an M1 Mini 8GB running as a home server and I am debating upgrading or not. It doesn't have much free RAM to begin with, and I am unable to test myself because it is headless and restoring it back to Tahoe would require me to arrange KVM etc.

Would appreciate it if someone can share their experience.

 

[kwandrews]

Good Q....I am on an M4 MBA 15" with 24GB. I didn't check utilization prior to the dev beta. Right now my memory pressure is at 25% running Safari and Messages as the open apps (and activity monitor of course). Memory used is 14GB, cached 9.78GB, swap 0. App memory 3.95; wired 4.42; compressed 3.10. MacOS27 actually feels better than 26 to be, subjectively....the 24GB helps here. I do have an M1 iMac with 16GB that I have not yet updated...when I do I'll do a comparison...probably with beta 2 or 3.

 

[benholt]

I'd push back on putting 27 on an 8GB headless box right now. I haven't installed GG on my own rigs yet (production stays on stable), but every major macOS bump in the last few releases has added a couple hundred MB to the baseline once Spotlight, cloudd, and apsd settle in — fine on 16 GB+, but on 8 GB that pushes a server that's already tight into constant swap. The bigger problem is exactly what you flagged: no easy rollback path on a headless machine without dragging out a KVM. If the M1 mini is doing its job on 26, there's no real upside until at least the public beta when memory behavior is closer to final.

 

[Nik]

Beta releases tend to use more RAM, just FYI.

 

[tong_si_nan_pei]

I'd push back on putting 27 on an 8GB headless box right now. I haven't installed GG on my own rigs yet (production stays on stable), but every major macOS bump in the last few releases has added a couple hundred MB to the baseline once Spotlight, cloudd, and apsd settle in — fine on 16 GB+, but on 8 GB that pushes a server that's already tight into constant swap. The bigger problem is exactly what you flagged: no easy rollback path on a headless machine without dragging out a KVM. If the M1 mini is doing its job on 26, there's no real upside until at least the public beta when memory behavior is closer to final.

Thanks makes sense. I will keep it on Tahoe for now. I did update to Golden Gate on my main PC which has 32GB RAM and it’s fine.

 

[boppin]

Right at startup 15.99 of 16 GB RAM used by Tahoe on my M4 Air.

Old post from me:

I think there's another factor that many people forget. Memory management has fundamentally changed since Mavericks. Since then, inactive RAM is recycled and compressed more aggressively and earlier. When I look at my MacBook Air after startup, the 16 GB of RAM are completely used. Exactly zero bytes are compressed and swapped out. Everything looks good.

Further reading:

Help! Linux ate my RAM!

Similar to macOS

 

[QuarterSwede]

For server use, no don’t update. Servers should always be on stable releases unless you really want to deal with bugs. I’d avoid until it’s stable. My server (running Debian Linux) is 2 years behind but it’s rock solid, like servers should be.

 

[boppin]

For server use, no don’t update.

No one should use a beta version for productive environments.

 

[benwiggy]

It doesn't have much free RAM to begin with,

With 8GB of RAM, I would hope that all the RAM is used all of the time. I wouldn't want any free, unused RAM.

 

[tong_si_nan_pei]

With 8GB of RAM, I would hope that all the RAM is used all of the time. I wouldn't want any free, unused RAM.

From what I have noticed, it doesn't work like that. Eg currently, macOS says it is using 6GB out of 8GB RAM, but already 1.5GB Swap. The Swap bothers me, a lot.

Basically, macOS starts using swap much before the RAM is completely full.

 

[LeVan]

From what I have noticed, it doesn't work like that. Eg currently, macOS says it is using 6GB out of 8GB RAM, but already 1.5GB Swap. The Swap bothers me, a lot.

With 16GB of RAM, the usage is more reasonable, no swap used but some compression, about 300-470MB.

 

[benwiggy]

The Swap bothers me, a lot.

Why? Swap is only a problem when it needs swapping back in quicker than the disk can supply. If you're not actually experiencing any performance issues, then I wouldn't worry.

 

[Populus]

Why? Swap is only a problem when it needs swapping back in quicker than the disk can supply. If you're not actually experiencing any performance issues, then I wouldn't worry.

It actually wears down the SSD, eventually.

 

[capamac]

Swap is a good thing; see https://chrisdown.name/2018/01/02/in-defence-of-swap.html

 

[RumorConsumer]

Golden Gate on 8gb of RAM is going to be just fine. They shipped the Neo with full awareness that they were about to trim the fat and tune up the OS in a major way and that people using those machines would be happy with them for years to come. If 8gb is fine enough now to do 4k video etc on a Neo, it'll be fine 8 months later with a better behaving OS.

 

[benwiggy]

It actually wears down the SSD, eventually.

Yeah, probably in about 22 years or so. 🙄

 

[boppin]

Yeah, probably in about 22 years or so. 🙄

Howard Oakley wrote more about 122 years.

 

[ADGrant]

After upgrading from macOS 26 to macOS 27 did anyone notice a difference in base RAM utilisation?

I have an M1 Mini 8GB running as a home server and I am debating upgrading or not. It doesn't have much free RAM to begin with, and I am unable to test myself because it is headless and restoring it back to Tahoe would require me to arrange KVM etc.

Would appreciate it if someone can share their experience.

Wait for the production release.

 

[Populus]

Yeah, probably in about 22 years or so. 🙄

Howard Oakley wrote more about 122 years.

Okay, I’ve done the proper calculations assuming an average lifespan of 600TBW and… you’re both right. It’s a ridiculous amount of years.

Even writing 100GB of data each and every day, the drive could last more than 15 years.

I guess I had the wrong perception here about NVMe longevity. So I was wrong in my assumption. Suddenly, I feel less anxious about swap memory and the longevity of the device.

 

[tong_si_nan_pei]

Okay, I’ve done the proper calculations assuming an average lifespan of 600TBW and… you’re both right. It’s a ridiculous amount of years.

Even writing 100GB of data each and every day, the drive could last more than 15 years.

I guess I had the wrong perception here about NVMe longevity. So I was wrong in my assumption. Suddenly, I feel less anxious about swap memory and the longevity of the device.

I believe early SSD models were more prone to these issues and this is not much of an issue anymore.