Memory
Memory pressure
What it is
Memory pressure is the graph at the bottom of Activity Monitor's Memory tab. It reflects how much free memory is left, how much macOS is compressing, and how much it has to swap to disk.
It's a better guide than "Memory Used", because macOS deliberately fills spare memory with caches that it can give back instantly.
Should you worry?
Green means fine. Yellow means macOS is compressing memory to keep up. Red means memory is full and the Mac is swapping, which slows it down.
What you can do
- Quit apps and close browser tabs you aren't using.
- Restart if your Mac hasn't been restarted in a while.
- If pressure is red during your normal work, your next Mac would benefit from more memory.
Related terms
Guides
What is memory pressure on a Mac? Green, yellow and red explained
Memory pressure shows how hard macOS is working to give apps memory. Learn what green, yellow and red mean, why “memory used” is misleading, and when more RAM helps.
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MemoryHow to free up RAM on a Mac (what actually works)
The ways to free up memory on a Mac that actually help, why "RAM cleaner" apps don't, and how to tell whether your Mac really needs more memory.
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