How to Check RAM on Mac?

Performance issues on Mac are rare however when it occurs, it’s really painful. There can be several reasons behind slow or sluggish Mac. It can be due to low RAM, too many apps, low storage, or too many open apps. 

Before you start optimization, you should dig out the reason behind it and check RAM usage on Mac. These steps on how to check the memory on Mac will help you find RAM usage and optimize memory on Mac. 

How Much RAM is Enough?

Random Access Memory (RAM) is the temporary storage to open apps and manage ongoing processes. It keeps the processes, temp files, and other clipboard items easily accessible. The older versions of Mac used to be shipped with 4 Gigs of RAM which may not be sufficient these days.

Macs these days are shipped with a minimum of 8 GB and above versions. You can upgrade your RAM to 16 GB if you are a regular user or anything between 16-128GB if you are a power user. 

When Should You Add More RAM?

The performance issue is the biggest indicator to check RAM usage on Mac and add up more power. If you are using heavy apps or multiple apps at a time, you should consider upgrading your RAM. A spinning wheel is another indicator of low RAM. If you are seeing the spinning wheel too often, check RAM and plan to add up more RAM.

When you run out of RAM, you may experience lag while typing or encounter the ‘Your system has run out of application memory’ error message. You may see freezing windows or apps crashing too often. If the apps or web pages are taking too long to open, you should consider checking and upgrading RAM.

Check RAM on Mac

Checking how much RAM you have on your Mac is easy. These steps will show you your total memory on the Mac.

Step 1. Go to the Apple menu and select the ‘About this Mac’ option. 

Step 2. On the Overview tab, you will find the total memory installed on your Mac. Do not confuse it with the available memory as it will always be lesser than the total available memory.

Check RAM Usage in Activity Monitor

Now is the time to check RAM usage on Mac. How to check the memory on Mac? Well, these steps can help you check used memory and what all apps are consuming higher memory. You can also quit the apps here if not required and regain memory on your Mac.

Step 1. Click on the Go menu and select the Utilities option from the list.

Step 2. Double-click on the Activity Monitor icon to check RAM usage on Mac.

Step 3. Click on the Memory tab on the top to check RAM usage.

Step 4. Click on the Memory column again to sort apps by highest to lowest memory usage.

Step 5. Click on any app and it will show you the memory usage index. You can check the Physical Memory, Memory Used, Cached Files, Swap Used, and other details.

You can click and check all the open apps and figure out how much memory is consumed by every individual app. You can also switch to other tabs and figure out CPU usage or Disk usage. If you realize that you have low RAM, you can Upgrade RAM on MacBook Pro or your Mac by adding physical RAM.

How To Optimize RAM on Mac

Now that we know our total RAM and utilized RAM, it’s time to clean and optimize RAM on Mac. There are several ways we can optimize RAM on Mac. You can manually optimize RAM or use one of the Best Mac Optimizers to automatically keep your Mac optimized.

Quit Apps Using Activity Monitor – The first quick trick is to Quit Apps using Activity Monitor. You can access Activity Monitor using the steps above. Select the App or background running process and quit them one by one.

Restart Your Mac – If you are unable to identify which apps to close, you can simply restart your Mac to clear the cache and quit unwanted open apps. It will also kill the background processes and regain access to the used RAM.

Clean-Up Desktop Items – Too many desktop items can spoil the desktop view and performance of your Mac. you should keep minimum items on the desktop and also manage icons in different folders.

Reduce Startup Apps – Some apps automatically add themselves to the Startup List. You can check it in the Startup list under your user profile, select the app and click on the minus button to disable them from startup.

Final Words

This article on how to check RAM on Mac has the best ways to check total Ram and check RAM usage on Mac. You can also use these tips and tricks to optimize RAM on Mac. You can also explore how to upgrade Ram on MacBook Pro. Keep your RAM optimized to experience the best performance out of your Mac.