New M2 Air has 'Run Out of Application Memory'. This occurs even when only the finder is running. This is unacceptable. M2 MacBook Air 1T, 16Gb RAM.

There are 2 reasons for the "Your system has run out of application memory" dialog box. A. Your boot disk has very low free storage, and macOS cannot create page/swap files to offload virtual memory contents to disk. Depending on how much virtual memory is being called for, anything under 50-100GB of free storage may trigger the message. Apple menu (upper left corner) -> About This Mac -> Storage (tab) B. A process (or set of processes) has asked macOS for excessive amounts of virtual memory address space. In order to keep track of the virtual memory address space, the kernel creates virtual memory page tables. If there is a memory leak (process asks for a virtual address range, forgets to give it back, asks for another range, forgets again, wash, rinse, repeat), eventually there are so many page tables created there is no memory left for applications, and you get the "Your system has run out of applications memory". Look at Applications -> Utilities -> Activity Monitor -> View (menu) -> All Processes -> Memory (tab) you can see what processes are using lots of memory. Many of these processes will be background agents and daemons used to provide many of the macOS services, as well as your applications. Also keep in mind that each web browser tab will be a separate process running its own Javascript. If you have lots of browser tabs open, or if one of the browser tabs running Javascript with a bug in it, it is possible these browser tabs will add up to a lot of virtual memory demands, but no individual tab will look all that big.

You should uninstall it completely according to the developer's instructions. It's considered by most of the experienced users here as akin to malware.

You can check to see if you've removed all of the supporting files by downloading and running the shareware app Find Any File to search for any files with the application's or the developer's name in the file name.  For the software mentioned you'd do the following search(es): 

1 - Name contains gemini

2 - Names contains macpaw

Any files that are found can be dragged from the search results window to the Desktop or Trash bin in the Dock for deletion.

FAF can search areas that Spotlight can't like invisible folders, system folders and packages.  

If you get warnings that the file can't be deleted because it is in use or used by another app boot into Safe Mode according to How to use safe mode on your Mac and delete from there.

Note:  if you have a wireless keyboard with rechargeable batteries connect it with its charging cable before booting into Safe Mode.  This makes it act as a wired keyboard as will assure a successful boot into Safe Mode.

The only thing I can suggest is to post the EtreCheck report here using the Additional Text option when posting. This will show if there are any other Applications that are being run in the background on startup that could be consuming your memory. EtreCheck was developed by a fellow user here and provides no personal information in the report.

Using EtreCheck - Apple Community

Thanks Bob. I have the same though. Brand new. 2023 15 Air. 16GB Ram 525GB hard drive. Nothing on it but office 365 subscription. It shows all applications and Drive is taking it all up.

I have everything turned off like Mail,Messages,photos and documents for iCloud.

The biggest in activity monitor is

“Window server” 312mb next “system settings” 104mb then 50 and below for rest.

The storage shows 483GB of 494 GB used.

applications. 443GB. Documents 3GB. iCloud Drive 429GB. Photos 3.8 MB Mac OS 27GB.

Please help this is killing me. I use a new 8TB to store everything all I’ve done so far is use this to transfer photos and files from Sd cards to the 8TB drive

thank you in advance

You should really start a new thread and give enough context about your problem - it is NOT the same thing under discussion here. It is a problem with storage, not memory.

Your drive is full, or perhaps corrupted somehow. It is not like an application is using a lot of RAM.

When you do that, please run Etrecheck and include its report using the "additional text" button below your message.

What 3rd party app was problematic in your case?

I would stay away from any product from this developer - they are infamous as the creators of the awful "cleanmymac" that we here often refer to as "brickmymac"...

Also: click the circled i next to Applications... what do you see. I am guessing that something you are not expecting is using a lot of space.