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Question about RAM usage on Apple Silicon on macOS 15 (Sequoia)

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drysdalk

macrumors member
Original poster
Jun 18, 2014
50
20
Hello,

I have a question about RAM usage on Apple Silicon systems on macOS 15 (Sequoia). My current Mac is an old MacBook 12-inch with an Intel CPU and integrated graphics, running macOS 13 (Ventura). The system has 8GB of RAM, and that seems to be fine for my current purposes. When running all the software I normally use for my working day, Activity Monitor shows between 6.4GB and 6.8GB of RAM used, and Memory Pressure still being all green. I've never seen it start to swap or show anything other than green for memory pressure.

In detail, what I'm normally running software-wise is:

• Microsoft 365 software all day (Outlook, To-Do, Teams, OneNote, Edge)​
• Apple software all day (Safari, Mail, Messages, Photos, Calendar, Notes)​
• Miscellaneous other stuff individually on an on-demand basis (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Terminal, Music)​

Outside of the above list I do an occasional bit of gaming, but nothing too heavy - Apple Arcade games mostly, with Minecraft or other similarly-light things occasionally. And I'd never be running a game and the work software above at the same time, so when I run a game it typically has the whole Mac (and the whole 8GB) to itself.

What I'm wondering is whether or not 8GB would still be enough for all of the above on an M1 or M2 system, if it were running macOS Sequoia ? In particular I'm concerned about the impact of the new features in Sequoia, especially Apple Intelligence (which is quite heavy on memory as I understand it, if you enable it), and on how memory usage might differ on Apple Silicon fundamentally as compared to x86_64.

So for those who are using an 8GB Apple Silicon system - and especially those who bought an 8GB M1 or M2 Mac and have upgraded to Sequoia - are you still able to comfortably run all of your day-to-day apps in that 8GB, or have you noticed it becoming more of a tight fit on Sequoia compared to older releases of macOS ?
 
Last edited:
BrianBaughn said:
It could be said that the current base models having 16GB could tell you everything you need to know. I'm unable to comment on what life is like with 8GB of RAM.
Click to expand...
Hi - thanks for replying. Yes, that's pretty much exactly what I'm wondering about. Apple are notoriously stingy with entry-level RAM and storage in their MacBooks, and for them to have bumped the base models up to 16GB across the board (even for the entry-level M2 Air) is making me wonder if 16GB is the realistic minimum memory requirement for Sequoia with Apple Intelligence.

On the other hand, they were selling those same MacBook Airs with 8GB RAM as recently as three months ago (two months after Sequoia's initial launch), so you would hope that those models would have at least some fuel left in the tank...maybe.
 
Forget about Apple Intelligence, IMO. Like all other "AI" "products", it's overhyped garbage. You can (and should) just keep it turned off, in which case Sequoia on an Apple Silicon Mac shouldn't be significantly different in memory usage than Ventura on your Intel Mac.

That said, with all base Mac models at 16GB now, I'd recommend getting a 16GB Mac. It's just sensible future proofing regardless of whether you intend to use "AI".
 
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drysdalk said:
Hello,

I have a question about RAM usage on Apple Silicon systems on macOS 15 (Sequoia). My current Mac is an old MacBook 12-inch with an Intel CPU and integrated graphics, running macOS 13 (Ventura). The system has 8GB of RAM, and that seems to be fine for my current purposes. When running all the software I normally use for my working day, Activity Monitor shows between 6.4GB and 6.8GB of RAM used, and Memory Pressure still being all green. I've never seen it start to swap or show anything other than green for memory pressure.

In detail, what I'm normally running software-wise is:

• Microsoft 365 software all day (Outlook, To-Do, Teams, OneNote, Edge)​
• Apple software all day (Safari, Mail, Messages, Photos, Calendar, Notes)​
• Miscellaneous other stuff individually on an on-demand basis (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Terminal, Music)​

Outside of the above list I do an occasional bit of gaming, but nothing too heavy - Apple Arcade games mostly, with Minecraft or other similarly-light things occasionally. And I'd never be running a game and the work software above at the same time, so when I run a game it typically has the whole Mac (and the whole 8GB) to itself.

What I'm wondering is whether or not 8GB would still be enough for all of the above on an M1 or M2 system, if it were running macOS Sequoia ? In particular I'm concerned about the impact of the new features in Sequoia, especially Apple Intelligence (which is quite heavy on memory as I understand it, if you enable it), and on how memory usage might differ on Apple Silicon fundamentally as compared to x86_64.

So for those who are using an 8GB Apple Silicon system - and especially those who bought an 8GB M1 or M2 Mac and have upgraded to Sequoia - are you still able to comfortably run all of your day-to-day apps in that 8GB, or have you noticed it becoming more of a tight fit on Sequoia compared to older releases of macOS ?
Click to expand...

I have MacBook Pro 2017 with 8 GB Ram and Mac OS Ventura.

When I only open safari few tabs it start to swap even memory pressure is green.

Are you sure it never use swap ?
 
Last edited:
Family have both 2020 i3 8GB MBA and M1 8GB MBA running latest Sequoia. Both seem to run fine (at least nobody is complaining). Usage is normal software like you described.
 
anpaman said:
I have MacBook Pro 2017 with 8 GB Ram and Mac OS Ventura.

When I only open safari few tabs it start to swap even memory pressure is green.

Are you it never use swap ?
Click to expand...
Hi - apologies, I could have worded that better. To be clearer, I don't see swap significantly increasing as I run these apps. My swap usage typically settles at a range from a few hundred megabytes to just over 1GB. But it seems to do that no matter what I'm running; the swap usage doesn't much change from before I run my work apps to when they're all running simultaneously. And so since there's no active swapping taking place while these apps are running, I wouldn't expect the swap usage to be significantly affecting performance.
 
drysdalk said:
Hello,

I have a question about RAM usage on Apple Silicon systems on macOS 15 (Sequoia). My current Mac is an old MacBook 12-inch with an Intel CPU and integrated graphics, running macOS 13 (Ventura). The system has 8GB of RAM, and that seems to be fine for my current purposes. When running all the software I normally use for my working day, Activity Monitor shows between 6.4GB and 6.8GB of RAM used, and Memory Pressure still being all green. I've never seen it start to swap or show anything other than green for memory pressure.

In detail, what I'm normally running software-wise is:

• Microsoft 365 software all day (Outlook, To-Do, Teams, OneNote, Edge)​
• Apple software all day (Safari, Mail, Messages, Photos, Calendar, Notes)​
• Miscellaneous other stuff individually on an on-demand basis (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Terminal, Music)​

Outside of the above list I do an occasional bit of gaming, but nothing too heavy - Apple Arcade games mostly, with Minecraft or other similarly-light things occasionally. And I'd never be running a game and the work software above at the same time, so when I run a game it typically has the whole Mac (and the whole 8GB) to itself.

What I'm wondering is whether or not 8GB would still be enough for all of the above on an M1 or M2 system, if it were running macOS Sequoia ? In particular I'm concerned about the impact of the new features in Sequoia, especially Apple Intelligence (which is quite heavy on memory as I understand it, if you enable it), and on how memory usage might differ on Apple Silicon fundamentally as compared to x86_64.

So for those who are using an 8GB Apple Silicon system - and especially those who bought an 8GB M1 or M2 Mac and have upgraded to Sequoia - are you still able to comfortably run all of your day-to-day apps in that 8GB, or have you noticed it becoming more of a tight fit on Sequoia compared to older releases of macOS ?
Click to expand...
I use my base M1 Air in largely the way you describe - I'll usually have Safari (5-10 tabs), Outlook, Teams, Edge (5-10 tabs), Messages, TextEdit, Word, PowerPoint, and Screen Sharing open with occasional delves into Minecraft, BBEdit, and Terminal. The machine is running Sequoia and I have yet to turn on anything related to Apple Intelligence.

My memory pressure generally toggles between high green and mid yellow, and I don't really notice much in the way of slowdowns on this machine. I keep getting tempted to upgrade to, say, an M3 Air whenever I see them on sale if only for the 16GB of RAM, but I don't really need to. For this use I'd rate its 8GB of RAM as adequate, though starting to feel a tad tight. This has been a fantastic laptop to me in my classroom for four years now and I hope to get at least another year or two out of it.
 
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As I understand then Apple Intelligence is only coming to M3 and above.
So M1 and M2 won’t get it so won’t take the extra RAM usage.

I suspect that like they did with Intel and only had the new features on hardware that support it. So for what being done then an M1 or M2 shouldn’t get the new features such as AI, so should be fine.

My only Mac now is an M1 Studio which bought as no M1 Pro Mini and use ProRes so the ProRes Hardware was a requirement and no mobility requirement so a laptop with M1 Pro no cheaper.

However over the OS upgrades that done then no noticeable slowdown noticed.
 
With my 2014 Mac mini with 8 GB RAM and similar app usage to yours, I’d have a few hundred GB of swap that sometimes might expand to 2-3 GB. Once the swap was over about 1 GB, I’d see occasionally pauses. Nothing hugely problematic but I’d notice it occasionally nonetheless. Note though this was with a third party SSD without DRAM.

With my M1 16 GB, there was much, much less swap usage.

In your shoes I’d generally recommend a 16 GB M4 (edu pricing in Canada/US), but an 8 GB M1/M2 would work on a budget.
 
This 8 GB may be enough for you to run simple applications. And it's not like your computer will stop working. Please note that performance drops when using a swap file can be dramatic. I have made a video on this subject here.
 
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drysdalk said:
Hello,

I have a question about RAM usage on Apple Silicon systems on macOS 15 (Sequoia). My current Mac is an old MacBook 12-inch with an Intel CPU and integrated graphics, running macOS 13 (Ventura). The system has 8GB of RAM, and that seems to be fine for my current purposes. When running all the software I normally use for my working day, Activity Monitor shows between 6.4GB and 6.8GB of RAM used, and Memory Pressure still being all green. I've never seen it start to swap or show anything other than green for memory pressure.

In detail, what I'm normally running software-wise is:

• Microsoft 365 software all day (Outlook, To-Do, Teams, OneNote, Edge)​
• Apple software all day (Safari, Mail, Messages, Photos, Calendar, Notes)​
• Miscellaneous other stuff individually on an on-demand basis (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Terminal, Music)​

Outside of the above list I do an occasional bit of gaming, but nothing too heavy - Apple Arcade games mostly, with Minecraft or other similarly-light things occasionally. And I'd never be running a game and the work software above at the same time, so when I run a game it typically has the whole Mac (and the whole 8GB) to itself.

What I'm wondering is whether or not 8GB would still be enough for all of the above on an M1 or M2 system, if it were running macOS Sequoia ? In particular I'm concerned about the impact of the new features in Sequoia, especially Apple Intelligence (which is quite heavy on memory as I understand it, if you enable it), and on how memory usage might differ on Apple Silicon fundamentally as compared to x86_64.

So for those who are using an 8GB Apple Silicon system - and especially those who bought an 8GB M1 or M2 Mac and have upgraded to Sequoia - are you still able to comfortably run all of your day-to-day apps in that 8GB, or have you noticed it becoming more of a tight fit on Sequoia compared to older releases of macOS ?
Click to expand...
I run a similar load on my 8GB MacBook Air at work and it was fine under macOS 14, but 15 adds a bit more overhead and I get the odd beachball now (especially in Outlook). It shows around 7GB used, but also 1GB - 1.5GB swap. My 16GB mini didn't have any problems (I swapped it for an M4 Pro MacBook Pro 2 weeks ago).

If I was swapping devices today, I'd go for 16GB, even on a Mac. Until Sequoia, I had been telling people 8GB on a Mac is fine, limited, but fine. 8GB on a Windows machine with a similar workload is a non-starter, especially if Microsoft Teams is running, but the Mac coped well. Since Sequoia, I'd say 16GB is the minimum there as well. 8GB still works but for the workload you and I have, it is reaching its limits and you will notice. Apple's switch to offering everything with a minimum of 16GB post Sequoia has its reasons and that, from personal experience, is also my minimum recommendation.

I'm looking to swap out my company 8GB M1 Air in the coming weeks/month (waiting for the M4 Air release). It is still usable most of the time (fast enough, when slow compared to the M4 Pro), but opening a meeting request often causes 20 seconds of beachball, so it really needs to be upgraded. If I was buying a new or 2nd hand/refurbished Mac today, I'd give the 8GB devices a wide berth, it will only get worse with each new macOS update.
 
I for all my old hackintoshes and I have several of them install 32 GB which costs me about $50 . I won't always use it but memory prices are just ridiculously low. It is very easy to exceed the 32 GB barrier if you use professional video editing or graphics apps. If you're doing bigger projects with Adobe Premiere, Art Effects etc and you buy a new computer then 128 GB is almost standard. But that is only a fraction of the cost of the whole computer . On a Silicon Mac memory expansion is usually doubling its value and that is the problem.
 
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