I have been noticing that kernel_task is writing tons of GBs per day, up to 30 GBs. swap used is 0 bytes since I have 32GB ram so swap is not an issue here. Is this the "new normal" for Apple Silicon?
Anyone from MBP 14 M1 Pro generation (from ~2 years ago) has their SSDs died down due to excessive data writes with normal "pro" usage?
MacBook Pro 14″
Historically, MacOS is said to require 9 GB of drive space to go from cold OFF to up-and-running.
the complexity of macOS and the number of temporary items created, updated and destroyed in a day suggests the around 30 GB in a day is not so excessive.
30 GB a day is not nearly enough to use up the writeablity of a modern SSD drive. Yes the number of writes is limited, but is far higher than that, and the ability to substitute spare blocks pushes the practical numbers MUCH higher.
Are you using mostly Apple-Silicon-native Apps, or are you doing a lot of Intel apps run through Rosetta emulation (which will tend to push those numbers higher)?
Hey admontecillo,
We'd recommend reviewing this article as it provides information on what to do if kernal_task is using a large percentage of your Mac's CPU: If kernel_task is using a large percentage of your Mac CPU - Apple Support
If that doesn't help, we'd recommend contacting Apple Support for further assistance here: Get Support
Thanks!
mds is also used when making backups. It updates the index on the backup drive.
But those numbers are total writes since last startup. when did you last Start your Mac? This morning? or a week ago? or last month?
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I was shopping for a new SSD recently. The rated 'lifetime writes' numbers were interesting. The ones I was looking at were rated at 1200 Terabytes written, thats 1,200,000 Megabytes written. I think you still have a LOT of headroom. You are in no danger of having the lifetime of your drive used up anytime soon.
Hi admontecillo,
Thank you for that update. We would stand by our earlier recommendation to contact Apple Support.
Cheers.
Thanks for your reply!
So ~1-2TB write per month by kernel_task must be ok, then, by just using office/productivity apps?
I have yet to run some data I/O intensive tasks but I might run them using an external SSD via TB4.
That makes it weird since I haven't setup a backup drive yet. It was just a few minutes after boot up.
I am more concerned about the reason why macOS is doing such massive writes vs Windows OS or Linux.
Hi,
So far I have not experienced the excessive CPU usage by kernel_task. It is more on the I/O or data written.
And just this morning, I observed this mds_stores (most prolly caused by spotlight) going haywire in writing!
kernel_task writing up to 30 GBs of data daily in MacBook Pro 14 M2 pro 10C/500GB/32GB RAM
