Apple Vision Pro is now available in the U.S.

Sonoma Memory leaks

Any updates on when Apple will address the MAJOR issue of memory leaks ( AGAIN, this happened in Montery also ) on MacOS Sonoma, I have had nothing but crashes caused by memory leaks since upgrading and have several clients with BRAND NEW iMAC's and MACBook Air units with the same issues. This is CRAZY and Apple should have nevre released an OS with this BUG, especially since this is NOT the first time this has been an issue. Is anyone at Apple testing thigns anymore ?

MacBook Air (M1, 2020)

Posted on Oct 17, 2023 11:41 AM

Reply
Question marked as Best reply

Posted on Oct 19, 2023 2:34 PM

Very similar issues, see LOTS of complaints on several Apple boards. Have even ahd the MacBook Air totally LOCK UP many times and only a HARD SHUTDOWN will recover things. Have done a FRESH install with same issues. Another Apple OS issue that should never have been released.... wonder how long for a FIX this time around.....

16 replies
Question marked as Best reply

Oct 19, 2023 2:34 PM in response to Richard Gaitskell

Very similar issues, see LOTS of complaints on several Apple boards. Have even ahd the MacBook Air totally LOCK UP many times and only a HARD SHUTDOWN will recover things. Have done a FRESH install with same issues. Another Apple OS issue that should never have been released.... wonder how long for a FIX this time around.....

Nov 12, 2023 4:15 PM in response to PRP_53

I have had memory leaks on Apple Mail since upgrading to Ventura. The same continues with Sonoma. If I open Apple mail, then within five minutes I get the memory overload warning and have to force quit Apple Mail. I have spent MANY hours online and on the phone with "senior" Apple support and no solution. They confirmed TANGIBLE, REPRODUCIBLE, AND REPEATABLE evidence of the problem. But no solution.


One of the senior Apple techs just suggested using the Gmail web app. Wow.

Oct 19, 2023 1:15 PM in response to lloyd_dawson

Apple Mail App on Sonoma has a memory leak on both my MacBook Air 2023 and Studio 2022. Consumes >32 GB over 10's of minutes, continues growing until system memory is full and receive system warning. Have to attempt to quit app, or force quit, to recover. Happens after restart.


System and App software installations are rather vanilla - no secondary extensions/mods. Apps are all approved for Sonoma.


Nov 17, 2023 3:19 AM in response to lloyd_dawson

I have a new MB M3 w/ 36GB of memory, running 14.1.1 and I'm getting the "out of memory force close" pop-up. Stating I only have 5GB remaining, after force closing everything reported I only have 7GB remaining. I had a similar issue on my MB M2 w/ 16GB prior to trading it in. I've also experienced it on my Air M2. The common denominator is Sonoma.

Dec 3, 2023 9:33 AM in response to lloyd_dawson

I'm also seeing MAJOR memory leak with Sonoma, major one being "WindowServer".

The conclusion of the many tests I've done the last couple days to track this down (because it annoyed me so much) is that it is linked to external monitors.

MacOS freshly rebooted not connected to an external monitors does not exhibit such issue.

Then I connect my external monitor (Dell UltraSharp 32 6K Monitor - U3224KA - native res i.e. no scaling), do not start anything (especially the buggy DDPM Dell tool), leave it doing nothing over 1 full night and 1 full day and WindowServer process is showing up around 9GB (coming from less than 1GB before when no external monitor was connected).

Because I have the M3 Max with 128Gb, I noticed this when, with my traditional workflow, all my memory tools showed me that the system was using swap, was compressing memory already, and memory pressure was constantly increasing.

Over 1 or 2 weeks (or even less) WindowServer was easily consuming a whopping 200GB!

App Memory was showing that almost all my RAM was consumed despite no other process than WindowServer was showing abnormal amounts of RAM usage.

This is driving me crazy.

Oct 17, 2023 1:47 PM in response to lloyd_dawson

It is one thing to say there is a Memory Leak in Sonoma 14.0


It is an another thing to provide Tangible, Reproducible and Repeatable evidence to support this assertion.


Would suggest making a Bug Report to Apple as there may or may not be time before the 14.1 Beta is finalized


FYI - on 3 different Apple M1 / M2 Personal Computers - no Memory Leaks I can find, so far



Sonoma Memory leaks

Welcome to Apple Support Community
A forum where Apple customers help each other with their products. Get started with your Apple ID.