Is this normal memory pressure for an M5 Pro chip?!

[jay-A]

Anything - car, bed, bottle, plate, aircraft, shoes - has limits and performance will suffer if taken beyond those limits. Take a hammer to a plate and pretty soon, it's not a plate.

A Mac isn't a magical device that does whatever the user throws at it.

Sure, spend a lot of money on more ram, it will help for a while, but you'll likely wind up in the same place.

I beg to disagree. OP has M5 pro with 24GB of ram, this is a very beefy configuration and having memory go to yellow status with only a few webpages open is not normal. I don't think Safari behaves that way, even with resource hungry websites, and I would bet the OP uses a ram-hungry browser such as Chrome.

 

[tonmischa]

I would bet the OP uses a ram-hungry browser such as Chrome.

OP already told us he uses Safari.

Is this normal memory pressure for an M5 Pro chip?!

Safari

forums.macrumors.com

 

[thejadedmonkey]

So what leads you to believe that you need to manage open programs ?

what makes you believe you don't have enough ram?

High memory pressure, general slowdowns, and running low on disk space as my mac caches inactive data to disk. I'm pretty sure that last part is more due to memory leaks, but that again only leads credence to my claim that macOS 26 is utter poo compared to Sequoia and earlier.

 

[thejadedmonkey]

I beg to disagree. OP has M5 pro with 24GB of ram, this is a very beefy configuration and having memory go to yellow status with only a few webpages open is not normal. I don't think Safari behaves that way, even with resource hungry websites, and I would bet the OP uses a ram-hungry browser such as Chrome.

This is what everyone tryin to defend Apple is missing; it's not that I can't use my computer because it's limited, it's that I'm coming uncomfortably close to its limits when I shouldn't be. Sure it's fine today, but if RAM usage continues to climb at the same rate, I'll need 72gb of RAM by 2029 or 2030.

 

[benwiggy]

I am one of those who like peace of mind

Everything is going to be OK.


Also: you don't say what browser you're using, but if it's Chrome, you can add this to the list of reasons not to use Chrome.

 

[xee_]

Everything is going to be OK.


Also: you don't say what browser you're using, but if it's Chrome, you can add this to the list of reasons not to use Chrome.

Haha - thanks for the optimism. Safari 🙂

 

[MacCheetah3]

Thanks for the answers. Yes I see that some of the websites are taking up a lot of memory, but I still didn’t think an M5 Pro with 24GB RAM would act like this.

Should I pay the extra money to upgrade?

Also, as many of you have pointed out; many websites these days are RAM-hungry, which argues for having more memory in order to not having to close tabs? I'm very lazy in that term, and I rarely close tabs I don't use :/

To OP: I think you should reconsider how you are using the web. Many web pages, even from big names, are not made for long term running in the tabs. Developers expect that you close them from time to time, because the tools they are using to make them are not particularly good at memory management. Some pages even go as far that they just start using your cpu to do the stuff for them. Basically you are renting them your computer resources for free.

It is not normal that web page has more than 2GB of memory use. If it does, and it is not your data, like big project in figma, big data sheet in google doc, or similar..they are simply just bad, and require to close and reopen. If you do plan to use the web as you do now, yes, you need to buy computer with more memory. It might be a mac or PC does not matter.

But realistically do you need to invest more money just to keep tab open always? Isn't cheaper, better solution to close them? Does linkedin.com have 4GB when you close it and open again? Paying more money because of lousy developers leaking memory is just not wise decision.

if you get more ram those badly behaving webpages will just eat more

That video was from five years ago. The runaway of added, infinite background tasks (websites and otherwise) is always growing. Constant refreshing. Constant ad serving. Constant tracking. Caching all of that. Without regularly closing these atrociously bloated (web) apps, they will endlessly continue to consume and expand — as @Charlie Bonesx already noted.

One thing you could try on your path to being more efficient (i.e., less tabs) is change to a browser such as Brave (or DuckDuckGo). It will block a lot of these superfluous scripts, etc. However, many websites (rather development overseers) fight back on this and will critically cripple the site or render it entirely unusable if the client doesn’t allow all of their background crap. Which is why Safari has the balance of blocking some background stuff but not being aggressive.

Browser Data Collection Comparison

An interesting comparison on data collected by individual web browsers. None of it is a surprise really (although yikes at Safari browsing the Play web store!) but the lesson is whatever Android phone you have, always use the Samsung Internet Browser.

forums.macrumors.com

https://medium.com/@RiaDayal/i-tested-13-mac-browsers-so-you-dont-have-to-here-s-what-actually-matters-in-2026-59da02f72d43

… Or you could spend more money on a Mac config with more RAM. 😉

Related discussions:

M1 iMac memory usage in Safari

https://superuser.com/a/797193 Read the (spanning years) comments to the Answer. :) Anyway… If you are interested in viewing/monitoring things yourself: https://developer.apple.com/documentation/safari-developer-tools/enabling-developer-features...

forums.macrumors.com

Why does Safari write to disk?

So, beyond the amount of active tabs, we’ve seemingly narrowed down the other culprits. [/QUOTE] [/QUOTE] In which, we appear to be going down another path. With that said, I’ll provide these final notes: https://developer.apple.com/documentation/safari-developer-tools/web-inspector...

forums.macrumors.com

Some relevant resources:

Bookmark websites that you want to revisit in Safari on Mac

In Safari on your Mac, bookmark websites to quickly revisit them. Also rearrange bookmarks and organize them into folders.

support.apple.com

Group tabs in Safari on Mac

In Safari on your Mac, organize tabs into groups to conveniently move among related websites.

support.apple.com

Hide distractions when reading articles in Safari on Mac

In Safari on your Mac, use Safari Reader to hide menus and diversions when reading articles. See a table of contents and summary for longer articles.

support.apple.com

Keep a Reading List in Safari on Mac

In Safari on your Mac, keep a Reading List of webpages to read later, even when you’re not connected to the internet.

support.apple.com

 

[Populus]

You not seeing the entire picture. Your screenshot only shows your processes in Activity Monitor. Select menu View > All Processes to see everything consuming RAM.

Ohhh, I didn’t know this! And I’ve been using macOS since well before they introduced memory compression in Mavericks…

 

[Charlie Bonesx]

High memory pressure, general slowdowns,

I'm coming uncomfortably close to its limits when I shouldn't be. Sure it's fine today, but if RAM usage continues to climb at the same rate,

It seems your discomfort comes from looking at the memory pressure. “General slowdown” is pretty vague, how do you measure that and determine it is because you don’t have enough ram? RAM usage continues to climb as you add more RAM. If you provide the system resources it will use them, ESPECIALLY data mining social media websites and other poorly coded sites.

 

[capamac]

... but if RAM usage continues to climb at the same rate, I'll need 72gb of RAM by 2029 or 2030.

Yeah this has been going on since computing began. In the early years of the web, in the mid-1990s, I used a Mac LC III on campus, I used to allocate maybe 16 megabytes of memory if I recall correctly to Netscape 4. On Classic MacOS, you could assign memory limits to applications. 16 megabytes was plenty for numerous web pages open at once. But web pages then were much lighter and java wasn't really around. Certainly no huge java applications running in browsers, which I suppose is why many modern web sites are so RAM-hungry. Coz they're basically applications in a browser.

Ever-increasing RAM is a feedback loop ... the amount of RAM in the average personal computer climbs upward, then web designers respond by producing sites that demand more RAM. This in turn spurs computer buyers to desire computers with more RAM, which spurs web designers to demand more RAM, repeat x forever.

 

[thejadedmonkey]

It seems your discomfort comes from looking at the memory pressure. “General slowdown” is pretty vague, how do you measure that and determine it is because you don’t have enough ram? RAM usage continues to climb as you add more RAM. If you provide the system resources it will use them, ESPECIALLY data mining social media websites and other poorly coded sites.

Well I have an atomic clock next to my desk and every morning when I boot my mac up I time how long it takes. Sometimes it's .0000001 seconds slower than it was the day before, and that's just completely unacceptable.

/s

I'm not talking about websites, I'm talking about programs like IntelliJ or xcode. Right now, with Finder, Messages, Edge, and nothing else running, I'm using 14gb of RAM just sitting on the desktop.

Apple memory management is great, and the SSD is faster than DDR2 RAM, so writing data to disk is fast, but it's a coverup for the fact that I'm using over 1/2 of my RAM just sitting at the desktop.

 

[unkl bob]

@xee_ this is my .02 - this is NOT really an issue at all unless you are experiencing real problems.

Looking at this Activity Monitor screenshot, I do not see anything that immediately concerns me. While memory pressure is showing some yellow, it seems only mildly elevated rather than heavily stressed. Yellow does not necessarily mean the machine is struggling; rather, it indicates that macOS is actively managing memory resources. Red memory pressure would be far more concerning.

One thing many users misunderstand is that modern operating systems, especially Apple Silicon Macs, intentionally try to use as much available RAM as possible. Unused RAM provides no benefit, so macOS aggressively uses memory for application data, file caching, browser content, and recently accessed information. The fact that this 24 GB system is showing nearly 21 GB of memory in use is not, by itself, evidence of a problem.

The large memory numbers associated with browser tabs also do not surprise me. Modern websites have increasingly become full applications rather than simple web pages. LinkedIn, Figma, Canva, Outlook, Google Docs, Netflix, and similar sites all run substantial amounts of JavaScript, maintain large data structures in memory, cache images and media, and preserve session state. Figma and Canva, in particular, are essentially graphics applications running inside a browser. It is therefore not unusual to see individual browser processes consuming 1–3 GB of memory.

Browsers also intentionally retain memory while it is available. Their philosophy is that free memory is wasted memory. Keeping data in RAM allows tabs to switch instantly, preserves scrolling positions, prevents page reloads, and improves overall responsiveness. If another application suddenly requires additional memory, macOS can request that browsers release some of those resources, compress inactive memory, or move less active pages to swap storage.

The nearly 11 GB of compressed memory may look alarming, but compression is actually one of the strengths of modern macOS memory management. Rather than immediately writing inactive memory pages to disk, the operating system compresses them in RAM, which is significantly faster than swapping. Apple Silicon systems handle compressed memory extremely efficiently, and seeing several gigabytes of compressed memory during heavy multitasking is not unusual.

Similarly, the approximately 3 GB of swap usage should not automatically be viewed as a problem. Many people still think that any amount of swap indicates insufficient RAM, but that is no longer necessarily true. The SSDs in modern Apple Silicon Macs are extremely fast, and macOS often uses swap proactively to optimize overall responsiveness. A few gigabytes of swap during a heavy workload involving numerous browser tabs, web applications, Teams, Claude, Outlook, and a virtual machine is entirely within the range of normal operation.

The virtual machine itself is using over 2 GB of memory, and there appear to be multiple active browser applications and web-based productivity tools running simultaneously. Given that workload, a 24 GB machine being largely utilized is exactly what I would expect to see.

Ultimately, the real question is not how much RAM is being used, but whether you are experiencing actual performance problems. If the system feels responsive, applications open quickly, tabs do not constantly reload, and there are no frequent beachballs or delays, then the machine is functioning exactly as Apple intended. From this screenshot alone, I would conclude that the system is behaving normally and that much of what we are seeing is simply modern browsers and macOS making aggressive use of available memory to maximize performance. Don't upgrade based just this snapshot unless you are having some of the problems I just mentioned at the beginning of this paragraph!

WOW ! THX for the comprehensive explanation.

 

[MacCheetah3]

I'm not talking about websites, I'm talking about programs like IntelliJ or xcode. Right now, with Finder, Messages, Edge, and nothing else running, I'm using 14gb of RAM just sitting on the desktop.

Apple memory management is great, and the SSD is faster than DDR2 RAM, so writing data to disk is fast, but it's a coverup for the fact that I'm using over 1/2 of my RAM just sitting at the desktop.

My personal peace of mind: If I pay for 24 GB of RAM, I want the computer to use all of it.
If I pay for 48 GB of RAM and see that it's sitting there unused, I'd be upset.

But we think - obviously - different in this regard.
And that's fine. I'm a shareholder too ;-)

In other words, otherwise explained:

Check if your Mac needs more RAM in Activity Monitor

Use Activity Monitor on your Mac to see if memory is being used efficiently and if you need more memory (RAM).

support.apple.com

View memory usage in Activity Monitor on Mac

In Activity Monitor, view the amount of system memory being used on your Mac, including physical, compressed, wired, and app memory.

support.apple.com

Interpret Memory Numbers in Mac Activity Monitor: Here’s How

Puzzling over the memory numbers in Activity Monitor? Trying to understand which apps take up most of the memory on your Mac? Find out here how to interpret macOS memory figures and statistics (e.g., “memory” vs “real memory” vs “real private memory”) in Mac Activity Monitor.

ladedu.com

 

[Charlie Bonesx]

Well I have an atomic clock next to my desk and every morning when I boot my mac up I time how long it takes. Sometimes it's .0000001 seconds slower than it was the day before, and that's just completely unacceptable.

/s

I'm not talking about websites, I'm talking about programs like IntelliJ or xcode. Right now, with Finder, Messages, Edge, and nothing else running, I'm using 14gb of RAM just sitting on the desktop.

Apple memory management is great, and the SSD is faster than DDR2 RAM, so writing data to disk is fast, but it's a coverup for the fact that I'm using over 1/2 of my RAM just sitting at the desktop.

some of that 14 GB of ram is so that when you start inteljel or Xcode it won't take an extra .0000001 seconds for them to respond

I'm at work now typing on an m1 with safari, news, tailscale, TeamViewer, quickbooks, excel, mail, messages, one drive, things, amethyst, better display, claude, calculator ( oh, and activity monitor 😉 ) all running. I'm using 6 GB of RAM just sitting at the desktop. why so much less than yours? because the machine only has 8 GB. when I'm at home on my 64 GB studio guess what, it uses a lot more ram

the system will use as much ram as you have, that's the whole point. there's no "coverup"

 

[tonmischa]

the system will use as much ram as you have, that's the whole point. there's no "coverup"

Correct. Try opening the same apps on a Neo and on a MacStudio. Completely different RAM sizes.

 

[BSDnostalgia]

Thanks for the answers. Yes I see that some of the websites are taking up a lot of memory, but I still didn’t think an M5 Pro with 24GB RAM would act like this.

As was subsequently pointed out, the real problem here is that some of the web pages you have opened are badly behaving. My information may be out of date, but, a while ago, the web deployed something known as "Service Workers", which, I guess may have been done with "good intentions". The old cliche' about the road to hell applied, because naturally some websites went crazy with it.

It might help if, in Safari, you go to the Develop menu up top, open that, go to feature flags, open that, scroll down to Dom, and look for Service Workers, and, uncheck that. Restart, and, see if anything important to you stops working.

As I said, this information might be out of date. Firefox has a similar flag to disable Service Workers. AFAIK, Chrome does not.

 

[capamac]

Anything - car, bed, bottle, plate, aircraft, shoes - has limits and performance will suffer if taken beyond those limits. Take a hammer to a plate and pretty soon, it's not a plate.

A Mac isn't a magical device that does whatever the user throws at it.

Sure, spend a lot of money on more ram, it will help for a while, but you'll likely wind up in the same place.

Best response imo.

Just gotta manage the RAM that one has available.

 

[boppin]

In other words, otherwise explained:

When looking at your screenshot I think you have too much RAM in your machine.

 

[MacCheetah3]

When looking at your screenshot I think you have too much RAM in your machine.

😆 I cannot objectively disagree. I was seeing a little bit of yellow memory pressure on my M1 Pro MBP when I was deciding on a new desktop Mac. That… And I was intending to dabble in Motion (which I had little insight into) and higher-demand (i.e., more than iMovie) video editing. Unfortunately, neither has fully bloomed (yet?).

On the other hand, with the “AI" bubble(?) still floating, I don’t see myself in a bad position regarding current hardware.
🙂

P.S. Furthermore, the ability to cache nearly everything in RAM presumably reduces NAND wear. Currently, the SSD’s estimated lifetime left is still at 100% (22.4 TBW).
P.P.S. Depending on the industry conditions at the time, it gives me additional insight into adjusting/selecting my next Mac config.

 

[boppin]

😆 I cannot objectively disagree.

80.5 percent used.

And where are the cached files coming from? Intel based Mac? Or your system is bored.

Looks similar to my 16 GB RAM after startup.

 

[donawalt]

Wow, this thread just boggles my mind. First, addressing just the OP @xee_ as others have jumped in with their issues. He has said he is having no performance, stability, beachball issues - nothing. If he never looked at Activity monitor, he would be thinking "what a great laptop this is, I have some big stuff open all the time and it runs great." Why all the drama and analysis? As I said in detail earlier - DON'T spend any money on this laptop or an upgrade for what you are using unless you start to see a real-world problem! Why buy stuff just to make a memory utility optimal? The OS is working like it should. Give it a rest and move on.

 

[keksikuningas]

Music, Messages, Edge, plus Android Studio, a text editor, and one Emulator.

About 2 years ago I was using a similar stack (xcode instead of android studio and Spotify instead of Apple music) on an Air with 8gb of RAM. I literally tripled my RAM and have the same memory pressure. The only thing that changed is the OS.

View attachment 2640118

tbh running iOS simulator vs running android in qemu is vastly different. the latter is really slow for me as well on a m2 pro

 

[Omega Mac]

Wow, this thread just boggles my mind. First, addressing just the OP @xee_ as others have jumped in with their issues. He has said he is having no performance, stability, beachball issues - nothing. If he never looked at Activity monitor, he would be thinking "what a great laptop this is, I have some big stuff open all the time and it runs great." Why all the drama and analysis? As I said in detail earlier - DON'T spend any money on this laptop or an upgrade for what you are using unless you start to see a real-world problem! Why buy stuff just to make a memory utility optimal? The OS is working like it should. Give it a rest and move on.

Ah but we did learn some cool stuff about macOS ram managed as well as how not to freak out about memory and why, being the cool stuff. 😀

 

[boppin]

if you get more ram those badly behaving webpages will just eat more

As for web development:

back when I built and maintained the website for our men's choir here in the village, I was able to do everything using clean HTML5 and CSS3; there was no need for PHP or JavaScript. That’s why I wonder why some people overcomplicate things so much.

 

[rosie.macEvans]

I’d only consider 48GB if you’re actually feeling slowdowns or you do heavy pro work like big video projects, VMs, or large dev workloads.