MacBook Air M3 (16gb/512gb) - windowserver process high memory usage

mkim271 wrote:

Hi, I recently purchased a MacBook Air M3 (fully updated to Sonoma 14.5) and saw that the window server activity memory increased in activity monitor during my work flow (as expected). Connecting it to an external monitor also increased memory usage of window server (also as expected). But closing and quitting out of apps and disconnecting my external monitor do not bring window server back down - it stays high in memory (sometimes close to 1gb).

I noticed this may be an M3 specific observation, as my brother's M1 Pro MacBook Pro is efficient with the window server process (goes down in memory usage after unplugging from monitor, quitting apps).

Any idea if this may be resolved for M3 devices with OS sequoia?

The current stable release of Sonoma including bug fixes, security updates is macOS 14.5.1

Keep your Mac up to date - Apple Support

Keep your Mac up to date - Apple Support

Apple makes it very clear Betas are offered as is, and there is no support for them outside of the Feedback Assistant App. https://beta.apple.com/sp/betaprogram/submitting

I never considered 1 GB usage high memory.

Look at your Memory Pressure

High amount of swap files would indicate starving for memory

A SafeBoot Use safe mode on your Mac - Apple Support will sort many anomalies

Does a quick disk repair before it fully boots up, and certain system caches get cleared and rebuilt, third party system modifications and system accelerations are disabled temporarily.

Login and test. Reboot as normal and test. Caches get rebuilt automatically.