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jessatd75 Author

Level 1

30 points

macOS Sequoia Massive memory leak

So this seems to be an issue with all the recent macOS versions, the windowserver process just seems to eat more and more ram. Now when im running a single safari window with 5 tabs, mail, messages, notes, and onenote, the windowserver process i guess needs 5gb of ram to do its job. I rebooted, it started at 250mb, as soon as i start opening things it skyrockets. It seems to eat about 1gb per app window open. Closing the apps does not lower the processes ram usage. It will continue to grow with every app i open. I did a fresh reinstall of the OS, reinstalled all 3rd party apps by hand, of which i only use a few, and the issue persists. These numbers hold true on my m3 MBA with 16gb ram and my partners m1 base MBA. This is ridiculous Apple

Posted on Sep 19, 2024 4:38 PM

Top-ranking reply

Graig1122

Level 1

31 points

Posted on Oct 6, 2024 9:51 PM

I found the Reason！

When the mouse passes over the top window special effect every time, Windowser would be larger and larger and won't be erased.

View in context

65 replies

iTimod

Level 1

4 points

Nov 16, 2024 7:22 AM in response to jessatd75

So I had version 15.0 and everything was great. I'm now getting the problem after installing version 15.1. As someone here said, the problem is the OS in relation to USB-C and\or HDMI monitor connections. It's not one specific app. My particular problem is with the screensaver. My Citrix workspace App also but all that is irrelevant. I trying to figure out how to downgrade back to 15.0. No luck so far. Apple support said I would have to go back to Sonoma. Anyone found a solution yet?

jessatd75 Author

Level 1

30 points

Sep 19, 2024 6:12 PM in response to Barney-15E

I haven't. Im able to do pretty much everything i need with the stock apple apps and a few app store apps and highly regarded non-app store apps like VLC player. Im an IT consultant so aside from normal office stuff i pretty much live in terminal for SSH and MS RDP.

jessatd75 Author

Level 1

30 points

Sep 22, 2024 4:23 PM in response to joelhz

Yesterday, again, I did a complete reinstall of the OS, had to restore it to Sonoma, upgrade to Sequoia, and the issue persists. Right now to test, I am not using ANY 3rd party apps, not even ones from the App Store. After 1.5 hours my windowserver process was 2gb.

So if this isn't a software issue it has to be a hardware issue. BUT I don't see how that's that case when in Sonoma with my current laptop I never say the windowserver process peak over 1gb and that was with 1 external 1440p displays and the integral display all running with tons of windows and apps open. Plus no other apps are running away, all are using only as much ram as they did in Sonoma. Maybe is a compatibility issue with my exact config? 13 MBA, M3, 16gb, 512gb.

Barney-15E

Level 10

116,848 points

Sep 23, 2024 4:47 AM in response to dragontorc

dragontorc wrote:

I too have the memory leak issue.

Also, the screen flickers intermittently without apparent reason.

Kindly hope a fix is in the works ahead of macOS 15.1 release next month.

Neither are problems with Sequoia. There won’t be a fix anywhere for your problems. Call Apple.

Mac Jim ID

Level 7

26,741 points

Sep 23, 2024 12:01 PM in response to jessatd75

Activity Monitor simply won't show the cause of the problem, it just shows the effects. There is no doubt you have a problem that is causing WindowServer to balloon. That is why it has been recommended to use EtreCheck.

AlWeir

Level 4

3,266 points

Sep 23, 2024 12:20 PM in response to jessatd75

I have had one thing seize on my Mac since installing a week ago and that was between Safari Setting and System Settings when I clicked on Advance Settings in Privacy, then and it opened Advanced>Proxies>Change Settings. It froze in System Settings in the Proxy Window.

John Galt

Level 10

146,624 points

Sep 25, 2024 6:39 PM in response to Mac Jim ID

Mac Jim ID wrote:

Yep, that was the correct approach to take. I just had to bring it forward since your suggestion seemed to be ignored.

We are left to assume none of this discussion's participants actually wants to fix their Mac.

Sep 26, 2024 12:14 AM in response to jessatd75

Many users are experiencing similar issues....

Sometimes, resetting the System Management Controller (SMC) can help resolve memory issues...... To do this, shut down your Mac, then hold down the Shift + Control + Option keys along with the power button for about 10 seconds, then release everything and turn your Mac back on. Also, check for any software updates, as Apple often rolls out patches for these kinds of bugs.

If the issue continues, consider running the Activity Monitor to see which processes are consuming the most memory. You can force quit any unnecessary apps or processes that seem to be misbehaving. As a last resort, you might want to create a new user account on your Mac to see if the memory issue persists there—sometimes, user-specific settings can cause conflicts.

Barney-15E

Level 10

116,848 points

Sep 26, 2024 9:12 AM in response to MacDataSaviour

MacDataSaviour wrote:

Many users are experiencing similar issues....

Sometimes, resetting the System Management Controller (SMC) can help resolve memory issues...... To do this, shut down your Mac, then hold down the Shift + Control + Option keys along with the power button for about 10 seconds,

That will only work on certain Intel Macs. The OP has two Apple Silicon Macs.

And, those instructions may not work on some Intel Macs. You should just link to the Apple published SMC reset procedures.

Sep 27, 2024 8:16 AM in response to iceboooks

iceboooks wrote:

How to check on Mac for memory leak? I don't experience major memory issue after upgrading to Sequoia.

If you’re not experiencing issues, there’s seemingly not much point in looking around.

If that was misphrasing and you are seeing issues, see the previous replies in this thread for the tooling commonly used.

Oct 2, 2024 2:14 AM in response to jessatd75

I remember I used to use a Macbook Intel (2019) with 8GB RAM and it used to work so good (used until Aug 2023). I used to run dozens of tabs on Firefox and many other applications in parallel. Now I have Pro M3 and RAM consumption is 15GB+ on just PyCharm and merely 15 tabs on Firefox. Whats going on?

horacelu

Level 1

14 points

Oct 7, 2024 6:40 PM in response to jessatd75

Same issue here. And I believe this is related to iPhone Mirroring App.

I tried to keep away from that for 2 days, then the memory usage is acceptable even I connected to two 4k external displays (3 displays if internal included).

But when I accidentally clicked on the iPhone notification on my Mac this morning, the memory usage of window server went up instantly and keeps growing. Also that usage never decrease since then.

I am using macOS 18.0.1 on M1max MacBook Pro, so I deeply believe the memory leak problem is still not fixed.

Oct 10, 2024 11:52 PM in response to jessatd75

Same problem here. M3 mbp with macOS 15.0.1. Simply repeating switching from another app back to iphone mirroring make windowserver memory usage increase ~1GB. I had been enjoying iphone mirroring until I realized this. Really unfortunate. THIS NEEDS TO BE FIXED IMMEDIATELY!

Oct 18, 2024 8:54 AM in response to jessatd75

I have had two system crashes in the last week, previously, flawless performance. I see in the crashlog that process parralalsM was faulting out - I ran all app updates available, restarted the VM fresh, left the machine overnight with my regular open apps. This morning it was responsive again, but after a while the system initiated a process manager window I've never seen before stating system memory is full. In the list of processes (mostly in the 100s of Mbs usage), Firefox was at 57Gb. Clearly, closed Firefox, and system is still running. I'll report to Mozilla and Apple in case there is an issue there.

Nov 20, 2024 10:34 PM in response to jessatd75

Hi there,

I have done clean installation of Sequoia and installed all apps what I used in Sonoma. As soon as I installed I have paid attention the memory usage doubled. Normally I was running about 8-10GB and occasionally 15GB. Now I have stable 20-24GB without running any of memory hungry apps (tomcat, postgresql, java apps). Would Apple consider and check this issue soon?

macOS Sequoia Massive memory leak