Swap Used in Activity Monitor

[gradi]

I know what swap means so I am not asking about that. I just want to know what the specific number means in Swap Used. The word 'used' is past tense so does it mean all the swap used since I last rebooted so it is a cumulative figure that will keep getting bigger until the next reboot, but I never know what the actual current swap is at any point in time? Or does the figure really mean how much swap is being used at this particular point in time?

 

[unrigestered]

i'm not 100% sure as i'm still quite new to Mac, but my guess is that the value displays the actual current swap file size. This might decrease when not required over a longer period of time, or increase if more is required.

edit: this is what the Apple Support page has to say about this:

Swap Used: The amount of space being used on your startup disk to swap unused files to and from RAM.

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

 

[gradi]

Thank you for the info.

 

[fivenotrump]

i'm not 100% sure as i'm still quite new to Mac, but my guess is that the value displays the actual current swap file size. This might decrease when not required over a longer period of time, or increase if more is required.

edit: this is what the Apple Support page has to say about this:

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

Perhaps the confusion arises from the fact that the word 'used' here is an adjective rather than a verb in the past tense.

 

[gradi]

Swap In Use?

 

[unrigestered]

or simply swap? or swap size, swap file, etc?