I’m currently using a iPhone 6. I can keep about 1-3 apps active in the background depending on usage. No games, just apps like social media, banking, and Apple apps.
I’m getting tired of waiting on apps that have to do the “cold start” boot up. Apple apps take no more than 2secs but others can take 6-8secs if they’re not in the RAM.
I was wondering how many apps the newer iPhones can keep active in the RAM.
iPhone XS
With almost 2 million apps there are probably 2 million different RAM usage statistics. You are overthinking this. Apps are not monolithic; each is composed of many segments, and any segments not currently executing may be dynamically paged out, so the memory usage of any given app will vary second by second (or millisecond by millisecond). What ultimately matters is the performance of the device, and for all practical purposes there is no delay in loading or running any app. Note that this assumes that you don't try to micromanage apps by incessantly killing them in the misguided belief that it will save energy or speed up the phone. It will actually have the opposite effect, as apps that are suspended can restart faster and with less energy consumption than ones that have to be reloaded and reinitialized from storage. See these for example:
https://daringfireball.net/2017/07/you_should_not_force_quit_apps
http://speirs.org/blog/2012/1/2/misconceptions-about-ios-multitasking.html
http://9to5mac.com/2016/03/10/should-you-quit-ios-apps-answer/
With almost 2 million apps there are probably 2 million different RAM usage statistics. You are overthinking this. Apps are not monolithic; each is composed of many segments, and any segments not currently executing may be dynamically paged out, so the memory usage of any given app will vary second by second (or millisecond by millisecond). What ultimately matters is the performance of the device, and for all practical purposes there is no delay in loading or running any app. Note that this assumes that you don't try to micromanage apps by incessantly killing them in the misguided belief that it will save energy or speed up the phone. It will actually have the opposite effect, as apps that are suspended can restart faster and with less energy consumption than ones that have to be reloaded and reinitialized from storage. See these for example:
https://daringfireball.net/2017/07/you_should_not_force_quit_apps
http://speirs.org/blog/2012/1/2/misconceptions-about-ios-multitasking.html
http://9to5mac.com/2016/03/10/should-you-quit-ios-apps-answer/
It depends on whether or not you have Background App Refresh enabled for an app. Settings>General>Background App Refresh
That is in general incorrect. Apps enabled for background app refresh are not running all the time. They can run on a scheduled basis or if they receive an "event" notification. But most of the time they are idle. If by coincidence one has run recently there is a better chance of it being in RAM.
When you switch out of an app it does not stop immediately; it can finish what it is doing before suspending (so updates to its database don't get corrupted). If it is not enabled for background execution it remains idle until you open it again or it receives a notification. It will then start and run briefly to process the notification (e.g, to save the email just received). This is not technically background operation either.
When you shut down the phone normally each app is given a chance to save its work. That's why shutdowns are not instantaneous. This is also why it is generally a bad idea to force-restart iOS, as it can cause data corruption because the most recent apps have not had a chance to save their work.
I recommend going to the Apple Store and look at all the various phone models on display. you can interact with the phones to see what kind of performance each one has.
I've tried background refresh on for a week and noticed no perceivable speed improvements. It's suppose to inteligently know when, what, and how many times I use apps so I thought it would put those apps in the RAM around the time I use them. I don't think I have enough RAM overhead to make use of the feature.
Apple introducing feature: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=09c0H86v-7c
Borrow a friend's. I have never observed any noticeable delay when switching apps on any of the iOS devices I own or have owned. And currently that is a total of 12 (4 current). My iPhone currently has 290 installed apps plus the ones built in. OTOH, my Light L16 camera, which runs on Android, is very laggy with any of the apps other than the camera, which is its primary function. But even then switch camera modes takes several seconds.
All apps in the background "sleep" and do not use the phones resources.
iOS will release RAM as necessary. There is no need to forcibly quit apps.
Builtin Memory:
iPhone 6 has 1 GB
iPhone 8 has 2 GB
iPhone 8 Plus 3 GB
iPhone XS has 4 GB
Going by what you said, then all background apps are not stored in the RAM.
That doesn’t seem to be the case as I can often switch between my last used app and use it instantly without it having to do a cold boot load.
Everyone here is saying different parts of the whole picture. Here is a link that adds to what we are saying. How to force an app to close on your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch - Apple Support
this link mentions that apps are in standby waiting to be used again.
I’m not force quitting apps and using it regularly so this seems like a lack of RAM issue to me. The iPhone 6 has 1GB so I’m looking to upgrade. I‘ll never like the notch but the XS has 4GB RAM so if I’ll rarely see any cold boot app loads than I might get it over the 8. Which is what led me to asking you all for some real world ball park numbers.
This is has nothing to do with background app refresh, BTW.
I was specifically answering the question of why some apps seem to launch more quickly than others. Am I incorrect that apps with background app refresh enabled will launch more quickly?
I turned my background app refresh off and now instead of one day of charge I get 2-3 days on a charge and once it gets to 20% I charge it. If the battery has a finite number of charges then I am going to spread them out as much as I can.
I've been trying to found in-depth article on how background app refresh worked since Apple introduced it. This is the most detailed so far. Are you affiliated with Apple?
This is a user-to-user forum. Apple's participation (beyond keeping order) is minimal. Lawrence isn't affiliated with Apple. However, he is an engineer, with decades more experience with computers than your average Apple Genius. I would take his word on this (and on how batteries work, and several other things) over almost anyone's.
How many apps can iPhone 8 and XS keep active
