Most of my phones have 6GB RAM. IMO as long as you have 6GB then the bigger difference will be made by the OS rather than the RAM. My Google Pixel 4a, Google Pixel 5a, Xiaomi Mi 8 SE (running Pixel Experience S) all have 6GB and all keep things in memory much longer than my 8GB Realme Q3 Pro. You can lock apps in RAM with the Realme, but there is a hard limit of 5 apps to be locked in RAM. Not to get too negative, but it's little arbitrary things like this that ruin the experience on many phones. This is probably why the OnePlus 9 fell so far short of expectation.
I like "a lot" of ram because when I'm playing my games and somebody calls me, I want my games to stay open after I end the call (example). For yhis application, I feel like 6 GB is ok and 8 GB is optimal (for bigger games)
Meanwhile, still using my Redmi 5 plus with 3GB of RAM in 2022 since the phone got released. The phone's performance is bad but Android 12 has done wonders in terms of performance, It's miles better than what I had on Android 11 so I'm not feeling too bad keeping it a bit more. Although 32GB has proven too low of an internal storage now.
I think there is some portion of RAM reserved for the integrated GPU for Video Memory as well, that could explain why there is so much reserved memory. It can be observed in every device/phone even ones with 2GB RAM have small slice of it reserved .
I feel like it also depends on your phone manufacturer. A Pixel with 6 GB would perform way better than a Xiaomi with 6gb due to bloated MIUI and their "optimized" , way too agressive memory management
I've noticed on my OnePlus 7 Pro with 8GB, it appears to kill apps fairly often for no reason, for the most part I run the same handful of apps every day, yet most things don't stay loaded any longer than about a day if even that long, thanks for showing a comparison between ram boost on vs off it does seem like it might be kinda useless and causing apps to load more often, it may even be killing apps it isn't supposed to, I have AccuBattery and despite me telling the OS not to optimize it, the app is still occasionally killed.
I think this is just part of Color OS derivatives. My Realme Q3 Pro does the same, but it also has a limit on how many apps I can lock in RAM. Apps will stay open if they're locked in RAM for me. My guess is that they're doing these extreme things to significantly extend battery life. That looks great in reviews, but it can make for a frustrating user experience.
I have the Nebula Blue OnePlus 7 Pro with 12 GB Ram running Android 11. Let me start off by saying that I'm not a heavy user, but I use the Ram Boost . I don't seem to have this issue. Maybe it's the extra 4GB Ram? 🤷🏻♂️ I did go with this model 7 Pro to "future proof" knowing I would be using this phone for several years. It's been over 2 years and my 7 Pro is still running like new.
Garry, your test also shows how inefficient existing programming languages are in terms of resource utilisation. The reason obviously is high speed these applications can be developed at, but unfortunate side effect is huge memory consumption.
apps are built with javascript and frameworks that compile it some sort of inefficient native code, some hybrid mobile apps run on chromium node which is also inefficient
The idea of code reusability is very good (like shared libraries, etc.), but what's happening today is, that apps are built with frameworks, which are built on another framework, etc. It's a complete mess. Current web browsers, if properly written could probably use 20% of resources they're currently using. From the point of view of the market, this inefficiency is good, because it constantly creates demand for newer/faster systems.
This is certainly not the conclusion I would make. The demonstrated apps are games. Games are all about speed. This means that certain parts needed for speed optimization are needed in memory. Besides, it's the compiler and OS (as Gary showed) that makes the difference not the language itself.
You cannot really look at the free ram as a measure. Operating systems use free memory for caches and buffers to improve performance and then reduce these as applications require the memory. The thinking is that free memory is of no benefit to the user. Counter intuitive to what you first think about free memory. 2GB reserved could be for GPU as well. You see a lot of laptops reserving video memory from system memory.
Yup I'm using my refurbished Samsung galaxy S7, it's only got 4gb of ram but my phone runs fine. I should really download a custom Rom/ OS.. Edit: whoever rebuilt this phone put in rubbish grainy cameras, so I've ordered a Samsung galaxy A53 256gb and 8gb of ram. Don't know why but I got it since it is a bargain compared to the lesser memory models
I think part of me would like to see this test done with where your using the same brand. LIke a A52, S20FE, S21 ultra. The reason I am saying this because OEMS ram managment may very from brand to brand.
@@amashaziz2212 Not at all. Its comparing apples with oranges. Seeing how the same OS, ie Android, behaves under different manufacturers is interesting.
I'd say for budget phones: 1) low end - 4gb of ram 2) middle - 6 gb of ram 3) high - 8gb of ram Then for flagship phones: 1) low end - 6gb of ram 2) middle - 8gb of ram 3) high end - 10-12gb of ram
Year 2023 windows SBC have 16GB RAM. You may get away with-more than RAM-efficient linux-kernel android. Ports = no decent spacing to no decent number to port out to laptop-desktop replacement. Maybe winXP tablet-version(touchdriver) will be funny...
As a madman having a programming environment on Dex, I would say the more the better, but for most users 4GB should be enough given the applications are properly optimized.
@@Jur1_00 in regular usage i almost always have full ram and when im turning on camera phone starts lagging very hard and its going normally in few seconds when phone cleared up all apps. I don't want to open every single app after taking a photo or small video.
@@Jur1_00 and 12gb 1+8 pro works much smoother than 8gb version. I monitored ram in real time on both phones and 8gb version starts lagging when it filled with 6.7~ gb ram, and 12gb version at 11gb which is much more comfortable
I must say ram management on Samsung OneUi is amazing. I have 15 light to medium heavy apps opened in background and none of it got killed on this 6gb ram midranger.
So nice to see different manufacturers "playing" with this concept. I also would have liked Xiaomi in this comparison being notorious for their rammanagement but improved over the last few Android updates.
Nope MIUI still kill the app for no reason I have daily driver poco device I had to get rid of miui after 7 months (To credit to miui it has great working feature so you can pin app in ram so that app is never going to be killed for other one, it's bit extra work or step for user but it works fine)
@@itzmontupatel Your "nope" doesn't make sense to me. MiUI has improved for sure. And yes I said MiUI is notorious for killing apps in the background. But they have a few tweaks to prevent this. One of them is pinning it in ram. So, they choose to do it this way. You may like it or not but Xiaomi gives you enough room to change it. Btw: I'm an happy Poco F3 user for 9 months now.
@@itzmontupatel Your "nope" doesn't make sense to me. MiUI has improved for sure. And yes I said MiUI is notorious for killing apps in the background. But they have a few tweaks to prevent this. One of them is pinning it in ram. So, they choose to do it this way. You may like it or not but Xiaomi gives you enough room to change it. Btw: I'm an happy Poco F3 user for 9 months now.
I was playing a game on my M1 iPad then got a visitor. I forget about the game all day just to open the iPad up later and the game is still running and the battery is at 100 percent still
The truth is anything above 4GB will be enough for just about everyone unless you're using Android Desktop Mode or Samsung DEX (where you're going to need 8GB) Once you go above 6GB - in most use cases it's the law of diminishing returns
@@dbjungle keeping app in ram is different than playing real time. The real ram that ur phone has helps in realtime operating of the app as well as in keeping it in memory. Whereas swap memory helps only in keeping the app alive. ( Btw andriods are just now using swap concept, apple has been doing it for generations and it does it effectively, but they don't disclose how many gb storage they use for swap) but anyway swap memory is still useless. It helps in boosting about having ur device being able to keep so many apps in background, like apple does, but it ain't worth in real multi tasking. Suppose u have a big screen Say tablets where we can play realtime 2-3 apps simultaneously on a single screen. That real time aap operation doesn't rely on swap memory ( that is slow), so here is a real test for the ram. Thats why apple prudently doesn't just use that silly 4 gb ram on ipad pros, rather it ships them with 8gb-12 gb ram, and all andriod tablets still use just 8 gb ram and they fare more better in real time multitasking than ipad pro. Check samsung Dex mode, it is enough bold to keep 3 apps open simultaneously on a single screen whereas ipad pro is still limited to 2 apps on 8gb models. Apple knows if it uses 3 apps, its ram will struggle and everyone will know about their hypocrisy. So yeah swap memory is a useless memory that helped apple to get away with using less memory for years and now andriods also are doing the same. But in realtime multitasking like opening multiple apps on a single screen, 4gb memory will struggle even if it is apple and 8gb will fare well on both iPads and tablets whereas 12 gb is a sweetspot for both iPads and tablets.
My personal opinion was 6GB is more than enough. But I noticed my Galaxy S10+ with 8GB runs Chrome lot faster than my other phones. Later figured out Google rolled out 64bit Chrome for 8GB devices which needs devices with 8GB of RAM. So now I conder 8GB as optimal.
Running a Nokia 8 with 4GB ram, and it's running fine lol. Although I don't expect to have multiple large games in memory. 8GB is pretty much the minimum you'd want nowadays.
for this comparison, you should've used same manufacture phones,for example xiaomi with MIUI (all android 12 or android 11) as it has models from 100$ to 1000$ with 2GB al the way up to 12GB .. for years it is known that these UIs perform differently in ram management,so apple to orange was compared here and not really "how much ram is needed in android phones" . but anyway,thanks for the graphs
I agree. My 6 GB of RAM Note 7 Pro performs admirably on MIUI 12 and especially 12.5 as it's lighter. 8 GB is realistically the maximum I would need for playing VERY heavy games, which even if I buy a flagship, I wouldn't really need as I don't play games that often. But yeah, 8 GB is solid for me and 6 is more than fine.
There should be additional ram that is used strictly as hard reserved memory and users are given the option to allow certain apps/programs to stay reserved.
My first Z80 computer in 1980 had 16K of RAM. Computer evolution is exponential. Maybe I will own a quantum PC with tardigrade entanglement before I kick the bucket.
Owned a Commodore 64, then I upgraded to the Commodore 128, OMG I thought I died and went to heaven. Both computers had two floppy drives. So, on my business trips in my travel computer box it contained one computer, two floppy drives, many cables, desktop monitor, printer, it was quite a box of kit. Used Microsoft Multiplan, SuperBase, and a word processor, did not play games. Looking back in time those were fun days.
Thanks for making such videos Gary...such questions are always in my mind and whenever you upload such or speed test G videos, it is indeed a treat to me. 😊
I use splitscreen and freeform windows all the time on my phone running 2 or more games (or apps) at the same time + PiP video + music, so was a bit disappointed that it seems like no multitasking was actually done, which I doubt any of those tasks would have had a chance to go into zram.
@Gary: Which application did you use to monitor the RAM and SWAP usage? And in the same vein, which app did you create the graphs in? (Just curious, since I did not notice you mentioning this; unless I missed it.)
It doesn't need as much as it has. But in order to enjoy full multitasking without lag, the more RAM the better. . People need to stop trying ro compare Android to iOS. They are not the same just because they both use ARM chips. IOS has direct hardware access which is an advantage in some situations. ANDROID is a VM, which allows many programs to run without the need of worrying about hardware specs. The OS itself handles the tasks and manipulates the hardware as more tasks are requested. VM's tend to be slower, but hardware is more powerful now and top end Android even with all their features still outperform the iPhone my miles, especially in multitasking. Most Android can be fine with 6GB of ram, while a product like the Galaxy S and Galaxy Note may need 8GB, because they have more apps and services to juggle.
You just gave a good reason to go iPhone. Android is never as smooth and responsive as iOS and yes, it has to do with Android being a messy VM and iOS on the other hand running the apps natively. Its like console vs PC, console will run better with same hardware as PC because the software is optimized directly to the console hardware, while on PC it isn't.
I can confirm that 3GB is definitely not enough, can't always do split-screen multitasking(RUclips video freezes and fails to play ads) and with normal multitasking all apps have to be reloaded. Definitely time for a new one, the current one lasted 7 years, that was a good run.
Modern Android looks quite inefficient. I kept to Android 8 on my 4GB device, and I have ~2GB used with no apps. I also have an Android 5.1.1 phone which uses 700-800MB with no apps. I wonder what all is being put into RAM on these modern devices, and I wonder what using a ROM like LineageOS would do, as the flashable .zips are around 500MB in size.
It is not about RAM but very high speed memory. So iPhone can carry an app from ram to memory. And Android world it is not that easy because there are tons of different manufacturers. And different price levels. If android save apps to memory it would have a worse experience than now. Apple has few phones and they are completely compatible with os and hardware. Android side has thousands of different hardware. But at the end I prefer freedom of Android. If I pay a phone or pc, I wanted to be its master. Apple sells products and puts a lot of limitations on the product. Who is the boss, me or the product? That's why I don't use apple products.
Really? So you're OK with the fact that because of iOS tight memory management, if you load a web page in Safari, you're OK with the fact when you immediately switch to another app, Safari will freeze and stop loading the page until you go back? And of you open to many apps and the app is in a save state, reloading it may force the page to refresh? So you think that is better vs starting a page and immediately switch to another app the browser finishes loading the page so when you go back you don't have to wait? Or the fact having more ram means you can open far more apps and have far more apps be quiting in ram and not requiring a refresh? The S and Note models can hold as many as 30 apps in ram without a refresh, and it shows little to no lag in performance of other tasks. While on the iPhone the ram can hold roughly half as many apps and lag happens in situations like typing on the keyboard. Also because Samsung phones have more and better features, more ram has enabled Dex which means I don't need to go an buy a Samsung tablet, because I get the full desktop and tablet experience on a larger screen. Including the fact I can get a wireless display with a touchscreen and use Dex or just use my phone screen on the display too. The Note is the most powerful smartphone when it comes to productivity and capability. It is unmatched by any product including the iPhone. If you think spending more money to do less is great then fine. But being limited to what amounts to one or ywo tasks at a time, is hardly having your ram game downb
@@linuxsever5727 that's another reason why I like Android. When I spend my money on a phone, I want to make the screen & apps the way I want it & not what the manufacturer allow. Besides, when apple finally get a new feature, android have already had it for atleast 3-5yrs.
@@linuxsever5727 On the other hand, the freedom on Android is also the reason for the inconsistences when comes to user experiences. Not sure why are you so particular about who's the boss here. Since you paid for a phone, don't you like to have the best performances for the product you have paid for? iPhone is still the most popular phone around is because of its stability and consistency with apps and user experiences. Freedom comes with a price too in case you not aware and that's what happening to Android now.
Great in depth video (revisit) I really wish Android would start (or "go back") to keep more open apps in memory for longer, such as 4+ days, or at least allow the option, to keep more than the default 4 processes Because it's been very common for a long time now that I have 5-10 apps which I commonly use and need to revisit, to modify or reference, but not always in the same time frames Yet despite having plenty of available and full on empty RAM, according to running processes in dev options; most apps gets killed off and even straight removed completely from Recent Apps, and it's so annoying, to basically have to needlessly and pointlessly be forced to go back into every app constantly, or risk everything beyond the 4 most recent to be fully closed, despite having plenty of RAM and not having opened anything else besides the same 6-10 apps that might or would have used more RAM than those apps (which even in those cases, the common apps and system uses an average of 6-8GB, so even opening extra additional large apps would still not cause an Out Of Memory situation) I think maybe Android should have better or option for custom cached apps priority list, because almost every time when I've checked, there are bunch and plenty of "useless" random apps and processes that I Do Not need being cached, yet often actively killing my needed apps, and possibly ironically and idiotically counterproductively, it's killing my apps To cache the rest of needless ones that I personally almost never use This is a serious problem and a huge barrier crippling the productivity potential of these modern powerful mobile computers Imagine next time your desktop started randomly closing your open projects and windows, that you have open, simply because and after some time since it was last in focus; just so in case, it would be faster to open things Not currently in use (Yes obviously there's the unlimited power supply, but the point of Android processes management is that it's supposed to hibernate them so it would use close to no power, and the fact of it killing the processes is also going against the idea and concept of keeping things in memory so it wouldn't need to reload and re launch, from a cold state Please someone who can, consider communicating this to as many people as possible, who could make an impact for a better OS for everyone
"RAM" has become a bit of a misnomer given high speed cache and the performance characteristics of fast processors. Now access isn't equally good when done randomly. Statistically, things are hitting cache far more often than "RAM" (which I like to call "slow-memory") and upon cache misses, a heavy toll is collected with an otherwise fast processor sat in suspended animation spinning its gears uselessly for MANY cycles. Before the era of clock multipliers around the late 486 to early Pentium era, it was mostly okay and small caches began to be of some value but weren't absolutely critical just yet.
If 4gb can handle the heaviest android game, I don't see how more than that is needed. I have a Mi A3 with 4gb, and test right now with instagram, gmail, whatsapp, adobe reader, uber, netflix (with a open movie) and gmaps, all open. Just when i open onedrive, the adobe reader was killed. I think that 7 apps is enouth for any normal user, and even for games, who keeps switching between different games?? In my opinion 4gb is enouth, 6gb is the sweet spot, 8gb for heavy users, and more than that is just overkill.
I always used analogy of work desk and papers or documents on it.... In that case you as a person would represent the CPU which is doing all the processing and papers on the desk that you are processing are occupying space. At one point you will not be able to add new papers without moving the old ones, just like any device with OS will not be able to process new application until it frees some space in RAM memory. In the same way it was easer to explain how multi core CPU's are working (multiple persons on the same desk) etc.
Well done Garry, answered question i have often wondered about. It would be good to see an IOS comparison given the smaller ram Iphones have to work with.
I saw an article that said iphones use a lot of memory compression (zram) very smartly, which is why they do far better than android phones with less ram available.
@@manulovesjesus another thing to consider is that iOS and its apps are all built to Apple specs only. Most android developers will build their apps to either Pixel or the most popular Android device which would be a Samsung Galaxy, that leaves a lot of other devices not fully catered for which is sad. I do wonder if developers, especially American ones take full consideration of chips like MediaTek Dimensity.
This is quite topical now that Samsung is lessening the amount of ram on their Galaxy phones. 21 Fe is a disappointing 6 GB around at $700 and even the note 22 ultra or s22 ultra, is going to be 8 GB at the base model. $1200-1300 in the US
Get as much RAM as you can afford as the OS will usually use it so it is not wasted. As mentioned, it is also about RAM management and I have found Samsung is number 1 in Android with many Chinese OEMs too quick to kill RAM and the Pixel is one of the worst. My Pixel 3XL sucked with apps being killed (in first year, was an update but never great) with only 10 in memory (lightweight stuff). Also the Pixel’s kill all but a handful overnight which is terrible RAM management and explains why the standby time is so good (for Android, iOS can keep them in memory and still have good standby). My Pixel 6 Pro closes apps too frequently, with 12GB and shuts all but 5-6 down overnight which is frustrating, for example I used an app on my M1 iPad Pro that I had not used for two weeks and it was still in memory where I left it! So even with 12GB (or 8GB like the OP9P), if the RAM management is intrusive then you get a worst user experience. I still think Apple does it the best but Samsung is much better than bygone times, and is not too far behind Apple. Others like the Pixel 6 Pro are quite disappointing and need some work.
Wait, my iPad Pro M1 still kills off some apps, the same apps my Xiaomi 11T Pro kills off. And from the pixels I tried they didn't really kill off apps at all, but that was a long time ago
@@zaentyt837 Mine is the 16GB version so that maybe is why? But I did test it and put 40 in memory and they all remained when I tried all them a few hours later!
That's actually incorrect. Look in your device memory and you'll see how much RAM the system uses, and in most cases it's less than 2GB. So unless you're using something like Android Desktop Mode or Samsung DEX you'll rarely (it at all) have need for more than 8GB. Comments like yours is why Android OEMs get away with charging excessive prices for extra RAM that isn't even needed or used in most cases
@@franklingoodwin I think we saw in the test in the video that the 12GB Samsung performed better than the poor OP9P and the 4GB Pixel 3XL (that was rubbish for me no matter what you say). Although RAM management is partly to blame, it was clear that for a heavy multi-tasked a simple conclusion is more RAM is better. Obviously a casual user will not need that, say my mum, who uses a max of six apps, but this was based on power-users as per the test. If 8GB was enough why did the OP9P perform badly and it is clear if the S21U had only 8GB it would have never coped with Chrome and maybe another app or two? I rate the RAM number far more than the CPU or GPU or storage, it is the heart of the phone and the more the merrier, so respectfully I disagree.
@@andyH_England A lot of that is due to software optimisation and RAM management. Generally speaking phones with more RAM behave differently regarding RAM management. Samsung phones for example will let you pin apps to store in RAM with phones with 8GB/12GB RAM but won't with phones with 6GB or less. I'd say its less to do with the amount of RAM a phone has but what the OEM chooses to do with it. Bloatware also has to be taken into account. Any phone that can't handle Chrome and more than one other app has poor RAM management or it's Chrome being a poorly optimised (which is definitely the case) app. Also, why compare phones from years ago? Wouldn't it be a fairer test to compare phones from the current generation with different amounts of RAM? If I compared my Samsung Galaxy S8 from 2017 to any phone from the last two generations then the results would be similar because older versions of Android used RAM differently. I personally feel that this is an Apples to Oranges comparison
I consider myself a power user but NEVER EVER play games on my phone. I have an OP7Pro with 8gb of ram and sure, some apps are killed here and there but in all honesty...who cares? Everyday apps like FB, Insta and so on takes seconds to open again. I understand that gaming is a big thing on mobile devices. But I'm 40+ years old. I use my phone for social media and my photography business. So this video didn't answer my question at all - Do i need more than 8gb in 2022 if I don't do games?
A phone with 8g 12g or 16g RAM and a top grade Arm cpu could outperform a average laptop if chrome os combined with Android can be installed on the phone and when plugining in a monitor it just shows the chrome os desktop. We can normal office jobs and light development jobs on the phone. The premise is that the applications must be optimized or maybe providing native api by Google to rewrite the applications daily used
why does the system take up so much RAM at the start itself???, it occupies 7GB RAM and only 5GB is free for the user in 12GB RAM Phone. In the lower end phones android system occupies approx 2GB and the remaining is free.
I think they use the RAM to make the run phone more smoothly. (Like loading plenty of system files into RAM so they don't have to access them from storage) My previous tablet I had up until recently (Galaxy Tab A 10.1) had 2 GB of RAM and could even do 1080p RUclips/Chrome multitasking on Android 11.
IPhone also needs more RAM, this whole “optimization” thing is just an excuse, IPhone pauses an app when you minimize it, making that app use less ram, every time i upload a video on instagram or whatsapp and minimize, the upload pauses, even when using picture-in-picture mode on youtube, the video sometimes pauses itself while the audio continues playing, that’s why IPhone has less software features it’s because it has small ram, i’m using an IPhone 12 Pro Max with 6 GB ram
BTW the 2 gigs is probably secured space for knoxx which runs in the base layer of the os. it probably doesn't show on the kernal cause it's sandboxed off at a hardware level, tho this is only a guess.
Finding 8gb in my OnePlus Nord with ram boost on is good for general use. Apps don't quit on me in background and performance is strong to the point I never need to reboot more than once a week and I only do that to maximize battery life.
Now, I realise that "things have changed" but I spent 45 years in IT, beginning in '66. The first computer, that I worked on, had 24K, not Meg, not Gig, of memory and we ran an insurance company's business with it.
Tbh depend on what will you use on your tab. for me ive been using Lenovo M8 3rd gen tab which only have 3gb of ram and 32 gb of storage. Keep in mind that i only use the tab to watch u tube, movies and maybe browse the web sometimes. I dont play game on the tab or anything. It works fine for me. If u want a better performance tab.. for gaming and other big stuff.. i suggest u to go for a higher ram and storage
The real problem I found in android was about the internal storage space . For some reason that I guess it is something like the swap space . android system will need 2gb of free space in internal memory independently of how much ram you have available ... when you are near that 2 gb limit of storage is when crashing or notification or froze , rebooting etc begins and if you are near or pass the 1gb android don’t let you install , update apps or even take videos or pictures having one gb available ... The issue become more serious because automatic updates or silent updates that lead to problems even if you delete some apps or media and free some space ; eventually this space is reduced by itself without you installing or doing nothing ( I try deleting and freeing space up to 2 more gigabytes and bit more and always is consumed silently this space very fast in android ) .. So In resume This issue is not solved even if you have and sd card mounted because android need this two free Gb from internal ; so My experience is to choice your model with a lot of internal storage always and my wish is for android manufacturers to put this necessary space in the device but separated from the normal internal space that is consumed every time you install or update an app , so if they do it the space for the correct processing always will be available .. Same apple should separate Original factory iOS system space from advertised internal space because they are always taking a considerable space from your device even when you never used ; and even more every time there is an update you will need that double amount of space in order to update it ; besides keep cleaning your system in iOS is quite a complicated adventure .
I remember this is one of the reason people switch to custom ROMs like Lineage Os, but having your device root is enough if there is no custom ROM available. Tricky enough.
@@TheFourthWinchester2gb is the standard notification of release space in my phone model with android 10; and also what I need for make smooth my experience in my favs apps. You can go with less.. it depends in what apps you use. Every app have a different consume of MEMORY and resources . If you use for example the latest gcams cameras mods that are recommended because they are great in android. Well most of it now consume a lot of resources ; specially the version 8.4 and of course games can also crash your phone fast.. 👍🏼
My 2016 phone has 4 GB of RAM. It never runs out of RAM, everything is so smooth for multitasking day to day basis (no game definitely). But it can hold asphalt, pubg mobile, and call if duty at the same time
It can hold other 2 in memory while playing 1 at a time. Try using split screen for running 2 apps simultaneously and these see if it can. Running app is different than just keeping in memory.
MiUI is harsh on killing apps in the background. You can give Apps you don't want to be killed priority. I like a clean memory with as less apps running in the background as possible. I often kill them myself except for the ones that are locked into memory like messengers, email, widgets etc.
Sir how does ram speeds affect the phone? Like lpddr5x is very fast compared to lpddr5 what are the advantages? And can ufs 4.0 storage be used as additional ram as they are fast too?
It's actually somewhat disturbing that in an age where practically everyone owns or at least has access to some kind of computer -- may it be a smartphone, a laptop, or whatever -- you still have to explain what RAM and storage are, as well as the differences between them.
There are millions of people who own cars, but I don't expect people to understand the technical details of fuel injection or engine management systems.
With the new galaxy tab s8+ and Ultra that are been sold at 8, 12, and 16g of ram, is that overkill? If you wanted to do video editing or sketching using a drawing app, 8g would still be enough?
Aside from hardware software optimization is what's most important when it comes to RAM management. Look at iOS. iPhones only have between 4-8GB of RAM. And RAM management is superb.
Because iOS is running app in native, while android is running on top of JAVA & VIRTUAL MACHINE, it's more complicated too run apps on Android, That's why Android uses more RAM 😬 and also in iOS which manages RAM is the app itself, while amdroid which manages ram is the OS Also that's why RAM MANAGEMENT on iOS is always better 😀 Because applications on iOS require less RAM than Android.
@@bbcmagetan8420 everything you said has to do with software optimization. No matter weather JavaScript or virtual machine is used directly to run the app natively or not.
I think the forefront lighting is nicely matched to the background. May I suggest you add a little bit of reverb and/or hall delay to your voice track to make it even more immersive/believable?
Hi Gary, what app or service are you using to see exactly which app is being put into the zRAM and which app is being killed and well what enables you to find out how much swap space is being used and by which app?
Silly question, why Android is so much ram hungry? There are not so many chip that use this OS, a better efficency is auspicable, as you said your Macbook that is more or less as powerfull as a flagship phone is using only 8GB ram to do almost everything, with a lot of swapping according to all the sources but only 8GB. Will be nice to compare ram usage in similar price point between Android and IOS. Thanks for your videos Gary, always brilliant.
What about if u open more tabs and videos in those tabs in chrome or an app that has extensions does chrome limit it to just a certain size for its max like a x32 bit computer? And what about battery?
It’s not a matter of being lag free. It’s more how much apps can you hold at the same time. So when you switch back to the previous app your progress is still there.
I own the same OnePlus 9 Pro (8GB RAM) and I've had the camera app and Genshin Impact (run at separate times) close all my apps and even close system apps like my launcher and selected wallpaper is reset. So I'm convinced the way OnePlus handle RAM management forces you to buy at least 12GB to have a stable user experience. Just a tip to anyone buying a OnePlus phone don't go for 8GB of RAM, also I keep RAMBoost off to try help but it's still not enough space. I'm hoping they bring Virtual Ram over from ColorOS so I can use my phone without it resetting after using the camera and gaming.
Excellent vid Gary. Few comments as a fellow Note 9 user: 1. Watching this, I have more appreciation towards iPhones and iOS. They achieve so much with so little. 2. OnePlus isn't the OnePlus we know ever since they merged with Oppo. Their OS plainly sucks. I suspect they even have merged packages in Android 11 even before their merger got officially announced. Such aggressive memory management is common on other Chinese brands, like Xiaomi. I don't think OnePlus will get any better with Android 12 onwards, 3. Regardless of RAM and CPU, I think the main reason why Android phones get gradually degraded is that their garbage collection is rubbish and the apps are horribly optimized. For instance, Microsoft apps that one commonly uses in a Note series, should be properly optimized, no? Recently my Outlook/Teams and other MS apps are so laggy, I know the issue is not with the RAM or HW, it is MS implementation and their Azure service integration. For some reason, whenever Teams is put in foreground, it bogs the system until it receives proper response from their Azure servers. The screen usually gets white, scrolling becomes almost impossible. Like, what are you doing MS?!?
Haha. Andriods are using swap concept just know. Apple has been using it since generations. Real ram of a 4gb iphone is 4gb+ all the free storage on phone ( say 50gb from 64gb). But that isn't worth it. Fortunately for iphone that almost every game thats there for iphone and andriods, consume just 400-800 mb of ram except Genshin impact which uses 1.4 gb. So this low consumption of ram by apps helps apple to get away with low ram. If there is any app which consumes 5 gb of ram, then both 4gb and 6gb ram of iphone will struggle to play this game ( swap memory doesnt help in real time operation of app), every andriod phone upto 8 gb ram will also struggle to play this game due to not having 5gb free ram. Only 10gb above ram will be able to play that game. Swap memory is gimmick both on iphone and andriod. It is real ram that helps in realtime operation of apps.
![Seungmin "그렇게, 천천히, 우리(As we are)" | [Stray Kids : SKZ-PLAYER]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/kAzmhLHePqU/mqdefault.jpg)
I wish you would also inculde 6GB RAM. Since it's very common in the mid-range segment. Even the S20 FE and the new S21 FE has models with 6GB RAM.
6gb is hell
@@fanban2926 why ?
Most of my phones have 6GB RAM. IMO as long as you have 6GB then the bigger difference will be made by the OS rather than the RAM. My Google Pixel 4a, Google Pixel 5a, Xiaomi Mi 8 SE (running Pixel Experience S) all have 6GB and all keep things in memory much longer than my 8GB Realme Q3 Pro. You can lock apps in RAM with the Realme, but there is a hard limit of 5 apps to be locked in RAM. Not to get too negative, but it's little arbitrary things like this that ruin the experience on many phones. This is probably why the OnePlus 9 fell so far short of expectation.
@@dbjungle Also: It 'says' 6GB on the box, but you aren't actually getting all of it for the same reason.
My phone has 3GB RAM 😂
I like "a lot" of ram because when I'm playing my games and somebody calls me, I want my games to stay open after I end the call (example). For yhis application, I feel like 6 GB is ok and 8 GB is optimal (for bigger games)
Agreed.
I have a 3GB phone and it can handle only 1 app opened. If someone calls you, bad luck, start the game again...
It's not about all ram for standby apps. Some oem kills app faster because to save battery power
Miui has a feature that you can lock your app in the RAM so that it can stay in the RAM if somebody calls the app that you lock will keep open anytime
@@oyen9476 disable optimization
Meanwhile, still using my Redmi 5 plus with 3GB of RAM in 2022 since the phone got released. The phone's performance is bad but Android 12 has done wonders in terms of performance, It's miles better than what I had on Android 11 so I'm not feeling too bad keeping it a bit more. Although 32GB has proven too low of an internal storage now.
Which custom rom are you on ?
@@siriusblack5187 Arrow OS 12
If you do ever decide to change, don't get less than 128
I'm also on custom rom, a12 not available for my phone yet tho (mediatek issue). But now, after reading your comment, waiting for a12 eagerly
S10 512gb android 11 good wait to try android 12
I think there is some portion of RAM reserved for the integrated GPU for Video Memory as well, that could explain why there is so much reserved memory. It can be observed in every device/phone even ones with 2GB RAM have small slice of it reserved .
Phones do this too?
Maybe that reseved ram is for the operating system itself.
1.5 gb of my 2 gb ram is being used by the system it self.... I literally force stoped all the apps i used and downloaded.. 75% of ram is being eaten
I feel like it also depends on your phone manufacturer. A Pixel with 6 GB would perform way better than a Xiaomi with 6gb due to bloated MIUI and their "optimized" , way too agressive memory management
I've noticed on my OnePlus 7 Pro with 8GB, it appears to kill apps fairly often for no reason, for the most part I run the same handful of apps every day, yet most things don't stay loaded any longer than about a day if even that long, thanks for showing a comparison between ram boost on vs off it does seem like it might be kinda useless and causing apps to load more often, it may even be killing apps it isn't supposed to, I have AccuBattery and despite me telling the OS not to optimize it, the app is still occasionally killed.
I think this is just part of Color OS derivatives. My Realme Q3 Pro does the same, but it also has a limit on how many apps I can lock in RAM. Apps will stay open if they're locked in RAM for me. My guess is that they're doing these extreme things to significantly extend battery life. That looks great in reviews, but it can make for a frustrating user experience.
I believe you installed new Colored Oxygen OS. Realme, oppo with ColorOS works the same. RAM Mangement on ColorOS is worse if not the worst.
That’s the OnePlus OS overlay & their aggressive battery management tools.
I have the Nebula Blue OnePlus 7 Pro with 12 GB Ram running Android 11. Let me start off by saying that I'm not a heavy user, but I use the Ram Boost . I don't seem to have this issue. Maybe it's the extra 4GB Ram? 🤷🏻♂️ I did go with this model 7 Pro to "future proof" knowing I would be using this phone for several years. It's been over 2 years and my 7 Pro is still running like new.
@@Kevin6t8 True, my 2.5 years old OnePlus 7Pro still runs like new, no lags, nothing.
Garry, your test also shows how inefficient existing programming languages are in terms of resource utilisation. The reason obviously is high speed these applications can be developed at, but unfortunate side effect is huge memory consumption.
apps are built with javascript and frameworks that compile it some sort of inefficient native code, some hybrid mobile apps run on chromium node which is also inefficient
The idea of code reusability is very good (like shared libraries, etc.), but what's happening today is, that apps are built with frameworks, which are built on another framework, etc. It's a complete mess. Current web browsers, if properly written could probably use 20% of resources they're currently using. From the point of view of the market, this inefficiency is good, because it constantly creates demand for newer/faster systems.
@@gwojcieszczuk good luck writing a browser engine
@@dimitri9502 I know. It's more code than whole Linux kernel source code.
This is certainly not the conclusion I would make. The demonstrated apps are games. Games are all about speed. This means that certain parts needed for speed optimization are needed in memory. Besides, it's the compiler and OS (as Gary showed) that makes the difference not the language itself.
I'm astonished that a 12GB RAM phone only has 5GB of available memory after fresh boot. So system and background processes took 7GB!
@Sifat Ullah please do a video how to do that. Thank you.
System and background process took 5GB rather and 2GB is reserved for some reason we don't know.
Still 5GB is mind boggling
@@wingchong68 Here you go: ruclips.net/video/X01hZJtfMJg/видео.html
You cannot really look at the free ram as a measure. Operating systems use free memory for caches and buffers to improve performance and then reduce these as applications require the memory. The thinking is that free memory is of no benefit to the user. Counter intuitive to what you first think about free memory. 2GB reserved could be for GPU as well. You see a lot of laptops reserving video memory from system memory.
@@fariz8713 thank you.
My phone has 6gb of ram and i don't think i've ever used more than 4gb of it. Even my second phone that has 4gb of ram still runs absolutely fine.
Yup I'm using my refurbished Samsung galaxy S7, it's only got 4gb of ram but my phone runs fine. I should really download a custom Rom/ OS..
Edit: whoever rebuilt this phone put in rubbish grainy cameras, so I've ordered a Samsung galaxy A53 256gb and 8gb of ram. Don't know why but I got it since it is a bargain compared to the lesser memory models
What phone?
I think part of me would like to see this test done with where your using the same brand.
LIke a A52, S20FE, S21 ultra.
The reason I am saying this because OEMS ram managment may very from brand to brand.
Note: i know that he mention this at the end of his video.
Comparison between pixel 3XL and iphone 13 with 4gb ram would be interesting
NO
@@generalginger7804 YES
That would be great to see!
@@generalginger7804 yes
@@amashaziz2212 Not at all. Its comparing apples with oranges. Seeing how the same OS, ie Android, behaves under different manufacturers is interesting.
I'd say for budget phones:
1) low end - 4gb of ram
2) middle - 6 gb of ram
3) high - 8gb of ram
Then for flagship phones:
1) low end - 6gb of ram
2) middle - 8gb of ram
3) high end - 10-12gb of ram
I believe 6GB is still the sweet spot,while 8GB is good for future proofing and leaving some headroom just in case.
I have the 12GB variant of the OnePlus 9 pro. The higher amount of RAM again with software optimization makes a big difference
What difference did you notice?
Probably a placebo effect.
Year 2023 windows SBC have 16GB RAM. You may get away with-more than RAM-efficient linux-kernel android. Ports = no decent spacing to no decent number to port out to laptop-desktop replacement. Maybe winXP tablet-version(touchdriver) will be funny...
As a madman having a programming environment on Dex, I would say the more the better, but for most users 4GB should be enough given the applications are properly optimized.
In 2022 in flagship should have at least 12gb ram and 8gb is not enough for me, i had 8gb 1+8 pro and i switched to 12gb version only because of ram
@@qalamiti6____________748 what do you do with your phone that you can't wait for few seconds for am app to load up?
@@Jur1_00 in regular usage i almost always have full ram and when im turning on camera phone starts lagging very hard and its going normally in few seconds when phone cleared up all apps. I don't want to open every single app after taking a photo or small video.
@@Jur1_00 and 12gb 1+8 pro works much smoother than 8gb version. I monitored ram in real time on both phones and 8gb version starts lagging when it filled with 6.7~ gb ram, and 12gb version at 11gb which is much more comfortable
@@Jur1_00 it's actually hell to have music apps be killed off or games I was seconds ago playing have to wait minutes for loading
I must say ram management on Samsung OneUi is amazing. I have 15 light to medium heavy apps opened in background and none of it got killed on this 6gb ram midranger.
For real?
@@sleepyhead78971 yup (on one ui 3)
Oooo ok ok, thanks bro
@hmm well some apps like youtube or insta did get refresh but none started from scratch. It resumed to the page that i left opened.
@hmm bro when did i say its a tablet. Its a phone not tablet
This proves that Samsung should not go back to 8 GB of RAM on their new super expensive S22 Ultra
8 is heaps I use 4 😂
So nice to see different manufacturers "playing" with this concept. I also would have liked Xiaomi in this comparison being notorious for their rammanagement but improved over the last few Android updates.
Nope MIUI still kill the app for no reason I have daily driver poco device I had to get rid of miui after 7 months
(To credit to miui it has great working feature so you can pin app in ram so that app is never going to be killed for other one, it's bit extra work or step for user but it works fine)
@@itzmontupatel Your "nope" doesn't make sense to me. MiUI has improved for sure. And yes I said MiUI is notorious for killing apps in the background. But they have a few tweaks to prevent this. One of them is pinning it in ram. So, they choose to do it this way. You may like it or not but Xiaomi gives you enough room to change it.
Btw: I'm an happy Poco F3 user for 9 months now.
@@itzmontupatel Your "nope" doesn't make sense to me. MiUI has improved for sure. And yes I said MiUI is notorious for killing apps in the background. But they have a few tweaks to prevent this. One of them is pinning it in ram. So, they choose to do it this way. You may like it or not but Xiaomi gives you enough room to change it.
Btw: I'm an happy Poco F3 user for 9 months now.
I was playing a game on my M1 iPad then got a visitor. I forget about the game all day just to open the iPad up later and the game is still running and the battery is at 100 percent still
The truth is anything above 4GB will be enough for just about everyone unless you're using Android Desktop Mode or Samsung DEX (where you're going to need 8GB) Once you go above 6GB - in most use cases it's the law of diminishing returns
I 100% agree with you. Or unless you run 6 games at once LOL.
@@dbjungle keeping app in ram is different than playing real time.
The real ram that ur phone has helps in realtime operating of the app as well as in keeping it in memory.
Whereas swap memory helps only in keeping the app alive.
( Btw andriods are just now using swap concept, apple has been doing it for generations and it does it effectively, but they don't disclose how many gb storage they use for swap)
but anyway swap memory is still useless. It helps in boosting about having ur device being able to keep so many apps in background, like apple does, but it ain't worth in real multi tasking.
Suppose u have a big screen Say tablets where we can play realtime 2-3 apps simultaneously on a single screen.
That real time aap operation doesn't rely on swap memory ( that is slow), so here is a real test for the ram.
Thats why apple prudently doesn't just use that silly 4 gb ram on ipad pros, rather it ships them with 8gb-12 gb ram, and all andriod tablets still use just 8 gb ram and they fare more better in real time multitasking than ipad pro.
Check samsung Dex mode, it is enough bold to keep 3 apps open simultaneously on a single screen whereas ipad pro is still limited to 2 apps on 8gb models.
Apple knows if it uses 3 apps, its ram will struggle and everyone will know about their hypocrisy.
So yeah swap memory is a useless memory that helped apple to get away with using less memory for years and now andriods also are doing the same.
But in realtime multitasking like opening multiple apps on a single screen, 4gb memory will struggle even if it is apple and 8gb will fare well on both iPads and tablets whereas 12 gb is a sweetspot for both iPads and tablets.
Yea it's funny seeing casual use people saying 8gb+ of ram is the minimum.
For galaxy S21 ultra, the 2gig missing is being used by the OS
No, system ram usage is listed in the 6 gigs being used
For camera or storage read/write boost 🤔
My personal opinion was 6GB is more than enough. But I noticed my Galaxy S10+ with 8GB runs Chrome lot faster than my other phones. Later figured out Google rolled out 64bit Chrome for 8GB devices which needs devices with 8GB of RAM. So now I conder 8GB as optimal.
Running a Nokia 8 with 4GB ram, and it's running fine lol. Although I don't expect to have multiple large games in memory. 8GB is pretty much the minimum you'd want nowadays.
Your explainations are simple and hit on point.
Please make a video explaining how the RAM management works on an iPhone and MacBook.
for this comparison, you should've used same manufacture phones,for example xiaomi with MIUI (all android 12 or android 11) as it has models from 100$ to 1000$ with 2GB al the way up to 12GB .. for years it is known that these UIs perform differently in ram management,so apple to orange was compared here and not really "how much ram is needed in android phones" .
but anyway,thanks for the graphs
I agree. My 6 GB of RAM Note 7 Pro performs admirably on MIUI 12 and especially 12.5 as it's lighter. 8 GB is realistically the maximum I would need for playing VERY heavy games, which even if I buy a flagship, I wouldn't really need as I don't play games that often. But yeah, 8 GB is solid for me and 6 is more than fine.
Excellent vid! I would like to see the same test on the iPhone for comparison of one version of Linux/Unix to the other.
1:25 Wrong slide title?
There should be additional ram that is used strictly as hard reserved memory and users are given the option to allow certain apps/programs to stay reserved.
So you're saying... There should be more ram? Got it.
How much RAM do you need?
*More.*
because, why not??
My first Z80 computer in 1980 had 16K of RAM. Computer evolution is exponential. Maybe I will own a quantum PC with tardigrade entanglement before I kick the bucket.
There may eventually be a quantum co-processor in consumer grade PCs. 2 years ago room temperature quantum computing was demonstrated to work.
Yea I remember when 128 MB was like HUGE lol
@@kwakes212 how old were you
@Bread Cat probably like 11 or so, it was like 1997 maybe? Whenever the first diablo came out
Owned a Commodore 64, then I upgraded to the Commodore 128, OMG I thought I died and went to heaven. Both computers had two floppy drives. So, on my business trips in my travel computer box it contained one computer, two floppy drives, many cables, desktop monitor, printer, it was quite a box of kit. Used Microsoft Multiplan, SuperBase, and a word processor, did not play games. Looking back in time those were fun days.
Thanks for making such videos Gary...such questions are always in my mind and whenever you upload such or speed test G videos, it is indeed a treat to me. 😊
I use splitscreen and freeform windows all the time on my phone running 2 or more games (or apps) at the same time + PiP video + music, so was a bit disappointed that it seems like no multitasking was actually done, which I doubt any of those tasks would have had a chance to go into zram.
@Gary: Which application did you use to monitor the RAM and SWAP usage? And in the same vein, which app did you create the graphs in? (Just curious, since I did not notice you mentioning this; unless I missed it.)
Yes, this is what I wanted to know as well.
.
Great analogy Gary!
21:20 2Gb probably reserved for GPU texture memory
Great segment Gary!
In world of android , I think you of other people have to take a look in custom roms to see how they perform
It doesn't need as much as it has. But in order to enjoy full multitasking without lag, the more RAM the better. .
People need to stop trying ro compare Android to iOS. They are not the same just because they both use ARM chips.
IOS has direct hardware access which is an advantage in some situations. ANDROID is a VM, which allows many programs to run without the need of worrying about hardware specs.
The OS itself handles the tasks and manipulates the hardware as more tasks are requested. VM's tend to be slower, but hardware is more powerful now and top end Android even with all their features still outperform the iPhone my miles, especially in multitasking.
Most Android can be fine with 6GB of ram, while a product like the Galaxy S and Galaxy Note may need 8GB, because they have more apps and services to juggle.
You just gave a good reason to go iPhone. Android is never as smooth and responsive as iOS and yes, it has to do with Android being a messy VM and iOS on the other hand running the apps natively. Its like console vs PC, console will run better with same hardware as PC because the software is optimized directly to the console hardware, while on PC it isn't.
@@teemuvesala9575 In Samsung is very smooth and responsive
@@teemuvesala9575 120hz makes a difrent effect
I can confirm that 3GB is definitely not enough, can't always do split-screen multitasking(RUclips video freezes and fails to play ads) and with normal multitasking all apps have to be reloaded.
Definitely time for a new one, the current one lasted 7 years, that was a good run.
Thanks for this great video.
I would really like to see a video that compares the ram management of Pixel 6 vs Samsung vs one plus vs iphone
That would be great to see!
1. Pixel
2. Samsung
3.Apple
4.Oneplus
Pixel and miui are very aosp even though miui is highly customized aosp skins. It will kill apps as soon as possible
If you root your device, you can use swap partition on sdcard, its very usefull especialy if u are heavy multitask user. Just use fast sdcard.
Modern Android looks quite inefficient. I kept to Android 8 on my 4GB device, and I have ~2GB used with no apps. I also have an Android 5.1.1 phone which uses 700-800MB with no apps. I wonder what all is being put into RAM on these modern devices, and I wonder what using a ROM like LineageOS would do, as the flashable .zips are around 500MB in size.
I really was changing my smartphone and was thinking how much ram do I need. Thank soo much for the video
That's exactly where Apple has mastered it's RAM game...
It is not about RAM but very high speed memory. So iPhone can carry an app from ram to memory. And Android world it is not that easy because there are tons of different manufacturers. And different price levels. If android save apps to memory it would have a worse experience than now. Apple has few phones and they are completely compatible with os and hardware. Android side has thousands of different hardware. But at the end I prefer freedom of Android. If I pay a phone or pc, I wanted to be its master. Apple sells products and puts a lot of limitations on the product. Who is the boss, me or the product? That's why I don't use apple products.
Not really android used java while apple forces devs to make native apps.
Really? So you're OK with the fact that because of iOS tight memory management, if you load a web page in Safari, you're OK with the fact when you immediately switch to another app, Safari will freeze and stop loading the page until you go back? And of you open to many apps and the app is in a save state, reloading it may force the page to refresh?
So you think that is better vs starting a page and immediately switch to another app the browser finishes loading the page so when you go back you don't have to wait? Or the fact having more ram means you can open far more apps and have far more apps be quiting in ram and not requiring a refresh?
The S and Note models can hold as many as 30 apps in ram without a refresh, and it shows little to no lag in performance of other tasks. While on the iPhone the ram can hold roughly half as many apps and lag happens in situations like typing on the keyboard.
Also because Samsung phones have more and better features, more ram has enabled Dex which means I don't need to go an buy a Samsung tablet, because I get the full desktop and tablet experience on a larger screen. Including the fact I can get a wireless display with a touchscreen and use Dex or just use my phone screen on the display too.
The Note is the most powerful smartphone when it comes to productivity and capability. It is unmatched by any product including the iPhone.
If you think spending more money to do less is great then fine. But being limited to what amounts to one or ywo tasks at a time, is hardly having your ram game downb
@@linuxsever5727 that's another reason why I like Android. When I spend my money on a phone, I want to make the screen & apps the way I want it & not what the manufacturer allow. Besides, when apple finally get a new feature, android have already had it for atleast 3-5yrs.
@@linuxsever5727 On the other hand, the freedom on Android is also the reason for the inconsistences when comes to user experiences. Not sure why are you so particular about who's the boss here. Since you paid for a phone, don't you like to have the best performances for the product you have paid for? iPhone is still the most popular phone around is because of its stability and consistency with apps and user experiences. Freedom comes with a price too in case you not aware and that's what happening to Android now.
Great in depth video (revisit)
I really wish Android would start (or "go back") to keep more open apps in memory for longer, such as 4+ days, or at least allow the option, to keep more than the default 4 processes
Because it's been very common for a long time now that I have 5-10 apps which I commonly use and need to revisit, to modify or reference, but not always in the same time frames
Yet despite having plenty of available and full on empty RAM, according to running processes in dev options; most apps gets killed off and even straight removed completely from Recent Apps, and it's so annoying, to basically have to needlessly and pointlessly be forced to go back into every app constantly, or risk everything beyond the 4 most recent to be fully closed, despite having plenty of RAM and not having opened anything else besides the same 6-10 apps that might or would have used more RAM than those apps (which even in those cases, the common apps and system uses an average of 6-8GB, so even opening extra additional large apps would still not cause an Out Of Memory situation)
I think maybe Android should have better or option for custom cached apps priority list, because almost every time when I've checked, there are bunch and plenty of "useless" random apps and processes that I Do Not need being cached, yet often actively killing my needed apps, and possibly ironically and idiotically counterproductively, it's killing my apps To cache the rest of needless ones that I personally almost never use
This is a serious problem and a huge barrier crippling the productivity potential of these modern powerful mobile computers
Imagine next time your desktop started randomly closing your open projects and windows, that you have open, simply because and after some time since it was last in focus; just so in case, it would be faster to open things Not currently in use
(Yes obviously there's the unlimited power supply, but the point of Android processes management is that it's supposed to hibernate them so it would use close to no power, and the fact of it killing the processes is also going against the idea and concept of keeping things in memory so it wouldn't need to reload and re launch, from a cold state
Please someone who can, consider communicating this to as many people as possible, who could make an impact for a better OS for everyone
Thanks Gary!! Very informative video!!
"RAM" has become a bit of a misnomer given high speed cache and the performance characteristics of fast processors. Now access isn't equally good when done randomly. Statistically, things are hitting cache far more often than "RAM" (which I like to call "slow-memory") and upon cache misses, a heavy toll is collected with an otherwise fast processor sat in suspended animation spinning its gears uselessly for MANY cycles. Before the era of clock multipliers around the late 486 to early Pentium era, it was mostly okay and small caches began to be of some value but weren't absolutely critical just yet.
My pixel 6 pro with 12GB is here to stay for 4 years this time around
If 4gb can handle the heaviest android game, I don't see how more than that is needed. I have a Mi A3 with 4gb, and test right now with instagram, gmail, whatsapp, adobe reader, uber, netflix (with a open movie) and gmaps, all open. Just when i open onedrive, the adobe reader was killed.
I think that 7 apps is enouth for any normal user, and even for games, who keeps switching between different games??
In my opinion 4gb is enouth, 6gb is the sweet spot, 8gb for heavy users, and more than that is just overkill.
I always used analogy of work desk and papers or documents on it.... In that case you as a person would represent the CPU which is doing all the processing and papers on the desk that you are processing are occupying space. At one point you will not be able to add new papers without moving the old ones, just like any device with OS will not be able to process new application until it frees some space in RAM memory. In the same way it was easer to explain how multi core CPU's are working (multiple persons on the same desk) etc.
Then I guess you will be disappointed by my video: Multitasking vs Multithreading vs Multiprocessing - ruclips.net/video/Tn0u-IIBmtc/видео.html
@@GaryExplains Not at all… I enjoy all your videos 😊
*GARY!!!*
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*HAPPY NEW YEAR FELLOW CLASSMATES!*
Stay safe out there everyone!
MARK!!! HAPPY NEW YEAR!
Well done Garry, answered question i have often wondered about. It would be good to see an IOS comparison given the smaller ram Iphones have to work with.
I saw an article that said iphones use a lot of memory compression (zram) very smartly, which is why they do far better than android phones with less ram available.
He already did a comparison video a few years ago.
@@manulovesjesus another thing to consider is that iOS and its apps are all built to Apple specs only.
Most android developers will build their apps to either Pixel or the most popular Android device which would be a Samsung Galaxy, that leaves a lot of other devices not fully catered for which is sad.
I do wonder if developers, especially American ones take full consideration of chips like MediaTek Dimensity.
4gb - minimum for entry and midrange level
6gb - minimum for highend or flagships level
8gb is recommended
10gb is great
12gb and so on is savage
*laughs in 2GB*
This is quite topical now that Samsung is lessening the amount of ram on their Galaxy phones. 21 Fe is a disappointing 6 GB around at $700 and even the note 22 ultra or s22 ultra, is going to be 8 GB at the base model. $1200-1300 in the US
Get as much RAM as you can afford as the OS will usually use it so it is not wasted. As mentioned, it is also about RAM management and I have found Samsung is number 1 in Android with many Chinese OEMs too quick to kill RAM and the Pixel is one of the worst. My Pixel 3XL sucked with apps being killed (in first year, was an update but never great) with only 10 in memory (lightweight stuff). Also the Pixel’s kill all but a handful overnight which is terrible RAM management and explains why the standby time is so good (for Android, iOS can keep them in memory and still have good standby). My Pixel 6 Pro closes apps too frequently, with 12GB and shuts all but 5-6 down overnight which is frustrating, for example I used an app on my M1 iPad Pro that I had not used for two weeks and it was still in memory where I left it!
So even with 12GB (or 8GB like the OP9P), if the RAM management is intrusive then you get a worst user experience. I still think Apple does it the best but Samsung is much better than bygone times, and is not too far behind Apple. Others like the Pixel 6 Pro are quite disappointing and need some work.
Wait, my iPad Pro M1 still kills off some apps, the same apps my Xiaomi 11T Pro kills off. And from the pixels I tried they didn't really kill off apps at all, but that was a long time ago
@@zaentyt837 Mine is the 16GB version so that maybe is why? But I did test it and put 40 in memory and they all remained when I tried all them a few hours later!
That's actually incorrect. Look in your device memory and you'll see how much RAM the system uses, and in most cases it's less than 2GB. So unless you're using something like Android Desktop Mode or Samsung DEX you'll rarely (it at all) have need for more than 8GB.
Comments like yours is why Android OEMs get away with charging excessive prices for extra RAM that isn't even needed or used in most cases
@@franklingoodwin I think we saw in the test in the video that the 12GB Samsung performed better than the poor OP9P and the 4GB Pixel 3XL (that was rubbish for me no matter what you say). Although RAM management is partly to blame, it was clear that for a heavy multi-tasked a simple conclusion is more RAM is better. Obviously a casual user will not need that, say my mum, who uses a max of six apps, but this was based on power-users as per the test. If 8GB was enough why did the OP9P perform badly and it is clear if the S21U had only 8GB it would have never coped with Chrome and maybe another app or two? I rate the RAM number far more than the CPU or GPU or storage, it is the heart of the phone and the more the merrier, so respectfully I disagree.
@@andyH_England A lot of that is due to software optimisation and RAM management. Generally speaking phones with more RAM behave differently regarding RAM management. Samsung phones for example will let you pin apps to store in RAM with phones with 8GB/12GB RAM but won't with phones with 6GB or less. I'd say its less to do with the amount of RAM a phone has but what the OEM chooses to do with it. Bloatware also has to be taken into account. Any phone that can't handle Chrome and more than one other app has poor RAM management or it's Chrome being a poorly optimised (which is definitely the case) app. Also, why compare phones from years ago? Wouldn't it be a fairer test to compare phones from the current generation with different amounts of RAM? If I compared my Samsung Galaxy S8 from 2017 to any phone from the last two generations then the results would be similar because older versions of Android used RAM differently. I personally feel that this is an Apples to Oranges comparison
I consider myself a power user but NEVER EVER play games on my phone. I have an OP7Pro with 8gb of ram and sure, some apps are killed here and there but in all honesty...who cares? Everyday apps like FB, Insta and so on takes seconds to open again.
I understand that gaming is a big thing on mobile devices. But I'm 40+ years old. I use my phone for social media and my photography business. So this video didn't answer my question at all - Do i need more than 8gb in 2022 if I don't do games?
we need to get much deeper into this
A phone with 8g 12g or 16g RAM and a top grade Arm cpu could outperform a average laptop if chrome os combined with Android can be installed on the phone and when plugining in a monitor it just shows the chrome os desktop. We can normal office jobs and light development jobs on the phone. The premise is that the applications must be optimized or maybe providing native api by Google to rewrite the applications daily used
A table will be a better analogy for RAM and the bookshelf as the secondary memory...
In your humble opinion!
@@GaryExplainsA slap disguised as a pat...! Hahahaha
8gb 256 I think should be minimum, but obviously if you're buying a flagship phone you want to use for 5 years 12gb 512+
why does the system take up so much RAM at the start itself???, it occupies 7GB RAM and only 5GB is free for the user in 12GB RAM Phone. In the lower end phones android system occupies approx 2GB and the remaining is free.
I think they use the RAM to make the run phone more smoothly. (Like loading plenty of system files into RAM so they don't have to access them from storage) My previous tablet I had up until recently (Galaxy Tab A 10.1) had 2 GB of RAM and could even do 1080p RUclips/Chrome multitasking on Android 11.
what program or app do you use to get all of the statistics and do you need root to use it?
IPhone also needs more RAM, this whole “optimization” thing is just an excuse, IPhone pauses an app when you minimize it, making that app use less ram, every time i upload a video on instagram or whatsapp and minimize, the upload pauses, even when using picture-in-picture mode on youtube, the video sometimes pauses itself while the audio continues playing, that’s why IPhone has less software features it’s because it has small ram, i’m using an IPhone 12 Pro Max with 6 GB ram
Your feedback seem convincing 👍
why blue lines in black background? 11:25
eh?
On the Oneplus, why is so little RAM available from the start? 500MB out of 8GB?
BTW the 2 gigs is probably secured space for knoxx which runs in the base layer of the os. it probably doesn't show on the kernal cause it's sandboxed off at a hardware level, tho this is only a guess.
Finding 8gb in my OnePlus Nord with ram boost on is good for general use. Apps don't quit on me in background and performance is strong to the point I never need to reboot more than once a week and I only do that to maximize battery life.
@Gary Explains Thank you for making the 2022 update on Ram Mx. 😉👍🏽 Things are getting heavier.
My phone has 12 gb ram!! But most of it is left!!
Now, I realise that "things have changed" but I spent 45 years in IT, beginning in '66. The first computer, that I worked on, had 24K, not Meg, not Gig, of memory and we ran an insurance company's business with it.
Nowadays they send pings as big as 24k :)
Very interesting experiment! Thank you!!
I'm comptemplating a 4GB tablet that I want to use for the next 3-5 years. Thoughts?
Tbh depend on what will you use on your tab. for me ive been using Lenovo M8 3rd gen tab which only have 3gb of ram and 32 gb of storage. Keep in mind that i only use the tab to watch u tube, movies and maybe browse the web sometimes. I dont play game on the tab or anything. It works fine for me. If u want a better performance tab.. for gaming and other big stuff.. i suggest u to go for a higher ram and storage
The real problem I found in android was about the internal storage space . For some reason that I guess it is something like the swap space . android system will need 2gb of free space in internal memory independently of how much ram you have available ... when you are near that 2 gb limit of storage is when crashing or notification or froze , rebooting etc begins and if you are near or pass the 1gb android don’t let you install , update apps or even take videos or pictures having one gb available ... The issue become more serious because automatic updates or silent updates that lead to problems even if you delete some apps or media and free some space ; eventually this space is reduced by itself without you installing or doing nothing ( I try deleting and freeing space up to 2 more gigabytes and bit more and always is consumed silently this space very fast in android ) .. So In resume This issue is not solved even if you have and sd card mounted because android need this two free Gb from internal ; so My experience is to choice your model with a lot of internal storage always and my wish is for android manufacturers to put this necessary space in the device but separated from the normal internal space that is consumed every time you install or update an app , so if they do it the space for the correct processing always will be available .. Same apple should separate Original factory iOS system space from advertised internal space because they are always taking a considerable space from your device even when you never used ; and even more every time there is an update you will need that double amount of space in order to update it ; besides keep cleaning your system in iOS is quite a complicated adventure .
This happens when free space is less than 500MB, not 2GB. Ask me how I know. I used my phone with less than 200MB free space for months.
I remember this is one of the reason people switch to custom ROMs like Lineage Os, but having your device root is enough if there is no custom ROM available. Tricky enough.
@@TheFourthWinchester2gb is the standard notification of release space in my phone model with android 10; and also what I need for make smooth my experience in my favs apps. You can go with less.. it depends in what apps you use. Every app have a different consume of MEMORY and resources . If you use for example the latest gcams cameras mods that are recommended because they are great in android. Well most of it now consume a lot of resources ; specially the version 8.4 and of course games can also crash your phone fast.. 👍🏼
Android 10 go edition and it never lags else when it heats up go edition is actually very optimized..
My 2016 phone has 4 GB of RAM. It never runs out of RAM, everything is so smooth for multitasking day to day basis (no game definitely). But it can hold asphalt, pubg mobile, and call if duty at the same time
It can hold other 2 in memory while playing 1 at a time.
Try using split screen for running 2 apps simultaneously and these see if it can.
Running app is different than just keeping in memory.
So basically it depends a lot in the UI running...
Killing apps in RAM does save battery - RAM refresh?!?
MiUI is harsh on killing apps in the background. You can give Apps you don't want to be killed priority. I like a clean memory with as less apps running in the background as possible. I often kill them myself except for the ones that are locked into memory like messengers, email, widgets etc.
My 20u at 16gb. Runs perfectly. I'm surprised how fast everything loads up.
Sir how does ram speeds affect the phone? Like lpddr5x is very fast compared to lpddr5 what are the advantages?
And can ufs 4.0 storage be used as additional ram as they are fast too?
It's actually somewhat disturbing that in an age where practically everyone owns or at least has access to some kind of computer -- may it be a smartphone, a laptop, or whatever -- you still have to explain what RAM and storage are, as well as the differences between them.
There are millions of people who own cars, but I don't expect people to understand the technical details of fuel injection or engine management systems.
12gb is a must i used tons of widgets and lot of chrome tabs. it doesnt take whole 12ram but seeing 12ram i know i could breath well
Very informative, helped me out, thanks a lot 👍👍
Professor Sims - Illuminating, as always.
With the new galaxy tab s8+ and Ultra that are been sold at 8, 12, and 16g of ram, is that overkill? If you wanted to do video editing or sketching using a drawing app, 8g would still be enough?
Aside from hardware software optimization is what's most important when it comes to RAM management. Look at iOS. iPhones only have between 4-8GB of RAM. And RAM management is superb.
Because iOS is running app in native, while android is running on top of JAVA & VIRTUAL MACHINE, it's more complicated too run apps on Android, That's why Android uses more RAM 😬
and also in iOS which manages RAM is the app itself, while amdroid which manages ram is the OS
Also that's why RAM MANAGEMENT on iOS is always better 😀 Because applications on iOS require less RAM than Android.
@@bbcmagetan8420 everything you said has to do with software optimization. No matter weather JavaScript or virtual machine is used directly to run the app natively or not.
I have 4 should I turn on ram plus 2/4 with Samsung..256 storage
Thanks for your videos, your ability to be thorough and precise helps a ton. This was helpful
Great video! Thank you..
I think the forefront lighting is nicely matched to the background. May I suggest you add a little bit of reverb and/or hall delay to your voice track to make it even more immersive/believable?
Hi Gary, what app or service are you using to see exactly which app is being put into the zRAM and which app is being killed and well what enables you to find out how much swap space is being used and by which app?
I truly enjoyed your video, subscribed for more knowledge! Thank you sir!
Silly question, why Android is so much ram hungry? There are not so many chip that use this OS, a better efficency is auspicable, as you said your Macbook that is more or less as powerfull as a flagship phone is using only 8GB ram to do almost everything, with a lot of swapping according to all the sources but only 8GB. Will be nice to compare ram usage in similar price point between Android and IOS. Thanks for your videos Gary, always brilliant.
Thanks to the new update to the my samsung which had 8gb but now due to ram plus I can get additional 4gb a d it is actually a quite nice feature .
Awesome . Explanation.. thnx..👏👏👏
I almost bought the s20 ultra cuz it had so much RAM but after some research, I couldn't find anyone who recommended it.
What about if u open more tabs and videos in those tabs in chrome or an app that has extensions does chrome limit it to just a certain size for its max like a x32 bit computer? And what about battery?
I'm testing a 3GB RAM Android 10 phone. With helio G35 SoC. Except for heavy games, such as PUBG, COD, Freefire, it's running absolutely lag free
It’s not a matter of being lag free. It’s more how much apps can you hold at the same time. So when you switch back to the previous app your progress is still there.
I own the same OnePlus 9 Pro (8GB RAM) and I've had the camera app and Genshin Impact (run at separate times) close all my apps and even close system apps like my launcher and selected wallpaper is reset. So I'm convinced the way OnePlus handle RAM management forces you to buy at least 12GB to have a stable user experience. Just a tip to anyone buying a OnePlus phone don't go for 8GB of RAM, also I keep RAMBoost off to try help but it's still not enough space. I'm hoping they bring Virtual Ram over from ColorOS so I can use my phone without it resetting after using the camera and gaming.
That's BS. I'm using realme with 8GB and never had problems running multiple apps. I'm glad I didn't buy that OnePlus
What a great informative content! Thank you. Helped a lot 🔥
Gary: How much do you actually need?
Me: All of it.
Excellent vid Gary. Few comments as a fellow Note 9 user:
1. Watching this, I have more appreciation towards iPhones and iOS. They achieve so much with so little.
2. OnePlus isn't the OnePlus we know ever since they merged with Oppo. Their OS plainly sucks. I suspect they even have merged packages in Android 11 even before their merger got officially announced. Such aggressive memory management is common on other Chinese brands, like Xiaomi. I don't think OnePlus will get any better with Android 12 onwards,
3. Regardless of RAM and CPU, I think the main reason why Android phones get gradually degraded is that their garbage collection is rubbish and the apps are horribly optimized. For instance, Microsoft apps that one commonly uses in a Note series, should be properly optimized, no? Recently my Outlook/Teams and other MS apps are so laggy, I know the issue is not with the RAM or HW, it is MS implementation and their Azure service integration. For some reason, whenever Teams is put in foreground, it bogs the system until it receives proper response from their Azure servers. The screen usually gets white, scrolling becomes almost impossible. Like, what are you doing MS?!?
Haha. Andriods are using swap concept just know. Apple has been using it since generations. Real ram of a 4gb iphone is 4gb+ all the free storage on phone ( say 50gb from 64gb).
But that isn't worth it.
Fortunately for iphone that almost every game thats there for iphone and andriods, consume just 400-800 mb of ram except Genshin impact which uses 1.4 gb.
So this low consumption of ram by apps helps apple to get away with low ram.
If there is any app which consumes 5 gb of ram, then both 4gb and 6gb ram of iphone will struggle to play this game ( swap memory doesnt help in real time operation of app), every andriod phone upto 8 gb ram will also struggle to play this game due to not having 5gb free ram. Only 10gb above ram will be able to play that game.
Swap memory is gimmick both on iphone and andriod. It is real ram that helps in realtime operation of apps.
2 gb is reserved for knox