Memory leaks in macOS Monterey plague small number of users
Complaints about memory leaks have started to surface following the release of macOS Monterey to the public, with users discovering unusually high amounts of memory being consumed by apps.
![A memory leak screenshot showing Final Cut Pro as using 24.24GB [via Twitter/Tyler Stalman]](https://photos5.appleinsider.com/gallery/45394-88367-memory-leak-reports-tyler-stalman-xl.jpg)
A memory leak screenshot showing Final Cut Pro as using 24.24GB [via Twitter/Tyler Stalman]
The release of a new operating system is typically accompanied by a period of teething issues, with users and developers discovering small issues that are later adjusted or fixed by Apple. On Monday, reports about memory leaks started to surface, specifically among Mac users who upgraded to macOS Monterey.
A memory leak is an issue when an application or a process falters and fails to release allocated memory properly. Over time, this could cause a service or an app to consume vast amounts of memory, reducing the resources available for use by others.
A number of complaints have been found on social media and the Apple Support forum, as initially reported by Macrumors, where users encounter the problem on their own Macs, running on macOS Monterey.
In the case of YouTube personality Tyler Stalman, he claims to repeatedly get warnings on his M1 Max-equipped MacBook Pro. The warning states he has "run out of application memory" with macOS advising to force quit memory-hogging applications, such as his 24GB instance of Final Cut Pro.
On Reddit, one user posted an Activity Monitor screenshot showing Control Center as occupying 9.19GB of memory, a macOS service that usually only consumes a few megabytes. A similar issue was noticed by Gregory McFadden on Twitter, with Control Center consuming over 26GB.
Another from Twitter posted an image on October 27 with the same out-of-memory warning window, with Firefox using 79.20GB of memory.
Memory leaks are quite a common issue with macOS applications, such as reports surrounding macOS Catalina affecting virtualization tools in July 2020.
While an irritant for those affected, there are still only relatively few complaints about the memory leaks in macOS Monterey. The low number of reports about the issue points to it being quite rare for users to experience, rather than an epidemic affecting many users in a major way.
Read on AppleInsider
A memory leak screenshot showing Final Cut Pro as using 24.24GB [via Twitter/Tyler Stalman]
The release of a new operating system is typically accompanied by a period of teething issues, with users and developers discovering small issues that are later adjusted or fixed by Apple. On Monday, reports about memory leaks started to surface, specifically among Mac users who upgraded to macOS Monterey.
A memory leak is an issue when an application or a process falters and fails to release allocated memory properly. Over time, this could cause a service or an app to consume vast amounts of memory, reducing the resources available for use by others.
A number of complaints have been found on social media and the Apple Support forum, as initially reported by Macrumors, where users encounter the problem on their own Macs, running on macOS Monterey.
In the case of YouTube personality Tyler Stalman, he claims to repeatedly get warnings on his M1 Max-equipped MacBook Pro. The warning states he has "run out of application memory" with macOS advising to force quit memory-hogging applications, such as his 24GB instance of Final Cut Pro.
On Reddit, one user posted an Activity Monitor screenshot showing Control Center as occupying 9.19GB of memory, a macOS service that usually only consumes a few megabytes. A similar issue was noticed by Gregory McFadden on Twitter, with Control Center consuming over 26GB.
So glad I got 64GB of memory on my new Mac so I can use 26GB of it for control center... Wait... what. pic.twitter.com/inCOPaii1o
-- Gregory McFadden (@GregoryMcFadden)
Another from Twitter posted an image on October 27 with the same out-of-memory warning window, with Firefox using 79.20GB of memory.
Memory leaks are quite a common issue with macOS applications, such as reports surrounding macOS Catalina affecting virtualization tools in July 2020.
While an irritant for those affected, there are still only relatively few complaints about the memory leaks in macOS Monterey. The low number of reports about the issue points to it being quite rare for users to experience, rather than an epidemic affecting many users in a major way.
Read on AppleInsider
Comments
But it sounded amazing.
Interesting to see how this develops.
I’m speechless - how that kind of a bug to make it to production for Apple!?!?
people have phrases like „computers get tired and need to be rebooted after a while“ or „don’t leave apps running, just start, use,quit“, etc. when in fact one should be able to launch all apps at login, and never quit an app until an OS update requires a reboot…
so, there‘s a HUGE difference between not knowing memory leaks are a problem and memory leaks not being a problem
I pulled out my retired, but now quickly reinstated mid 2012 MBPr. I have an Apple appointment tomorrow, but I’m absolutely terrified of plugging anything into it.
You like me and almost everyone who uses Monterey has the dreaded memory leak bug. Apple will fix it eventually.
Before then there is a simple temporary solution. Presumably you have several desktops on your mac. I have 11 at the moment. Go to one you don’t use often and open up Activity Monitor(its in your applications and on every mac). Leave it open all the time. Click on the column that tells you the use of memory by system processes and apps. Highlight(click on) any that look completely out of control, and then click on the little icon with the x in the middle of a circle. Choose force quit. If its an app it will quit and you will have to restart it. If its a process(weird names mostly) then it will quit but come back almost instantly in the small size it's supposed to be. For me about 15 minutes ago I noticed that the most common culprit, Control Center(which normally uses about 26 mb of memory) was slowly sucking more and was up to 144mb. Earlier this week I found it at 14 GB.
You can keep these little buggers from stealing memory by just keeping an eye on them. Be advised: if WindowServer is up at 1gb then its probably doing it too, and if you force quit that one, your screen will go black for about 5 seconds while the OS puts it back, and then you will have to type in your machine password again.
Hope this helps.
macOS normally handles memory very very well. I just launched 62 applications from the Applications folder and memory isn't under pressure. Of course much of what they address is shared memory until I start using them. After all that memory use is 13Gb out of 16Gb. Swap is 231Mb, which is tiny as well. Windowserver is now 2Gb but Im not under pressure so I don't really care.
So there's possibly a window sever bug here but not what is assumed.