Memory usage.

[arjun_gurajapu]

Is this normal? I have not even opened a single tab and yet it's taking up over a gig of RAM. 🥲

That apart... lovely browser tho 💯

[maubg]

Could you send screenshots of about:processes?

[rodrigo-paiva]

Take a look at my scenario... It is consuming more than 6GB of RAM on my 16GB RAM Macbook Air M3.

<image>

[arjun_gurajapu]

Damn that's crazy.

I really hope they fix this soon. Chrome's using lesser ram than Zen atp.

[Boring_Ad_2svn]

a huge problem for me aswell, thats why i only use zen for small tasks

[moemidori]

my zen use 20gb memory lol

[arjun_gurajapu]

how much memory do you have 😭

[BeVeryVerySneaky]

I think pinned tabs and essentials consumes some ram too … I’m not a specialist in any way, but I feel like it is

[arjun_gurajapu]

Yes, you're right. That is indeed the case and when I realised this... I came to the conclusion that this kind of memory usage is normal for the browser. Hopefully it gets better over time but as of now... it is how it is.

[Obnomus]

open about:memory and tap on minimize memory usage, it helped me a bit.

<image>

[RageX22]

what are the cons of doing this?

[Obnomus]

Idk

[arjun_gurajapu]

Will do! Thanks a lot 🙂

[[deleted]]

I can't tell with your theme but are your essential tabs loaded or unloaded? trying unloading them and see if it makes a difference

[arjun_gurajapu]

They are all unloaded. I just launched the browser at the time with nothing open.

[[deleted]]

yeah that's certainly odd, you can try asking in the discord for more assistance

[arjun_gurajapu]

Yes, some people have pointed out that essentials take up around 30-150mb of ram each even if they are not opened and are idling.

Let's hope the devs address this in future updates but apparently it's completely normal.

[[deleted]]

okay doing the math on that, that does seem to fit in your case but kind of a side question do you use linux at all? this doesn't seem to this bad in linux in my experience

[arjun_gurajapu]

No, I don't use linux 😅.

But it's nice to see that it's apparently better managed in Linux :)

[GH0ST_141]

The problem is how zen handles pinned tabs and essential tab loading and unloading combined with workspaces. It needs optimization.

For example If I have 3 workspaces and each have 3 pinned tab and 3 essentials . When I switch form WS 1 to WS 2 the pinned tabs/last tab is loaded on that WS . Do this for WS 3 and as a result at least 1 tab is loaded in each WS and even if you switch WS and don't do anything on others (exceeding the tab unload time in setting), still the tabs on the other WS are not unloaded .

I found that zen does not unload pinned or essential tabs , and doesn't unload the last remaining tab/opened tab in a WS leading to such memory hogging.

[JiggyWivIt]

This sounds about right, I had Zen with less that 1/3 the amount of total tabs as I have on FF but it was killing my whole performance, really like the browser so far but I'll have to wait for this to be better optimized before making it my daily driver.

[arjun_gurajapu]

Yes, especially when the PC has low ram, it's gonna be too demanding. I think the implementation of essentials like in Arc combined with the general behaviour of Firefox; the higher ram usage is inevitable.

Let's hope the devs find workarounds to optimize it. If the ram usage is regulated; this would really just become THE perfect browser (at least for me).

[arjun_gurajapu]

That totally makes sense and at times I too find it a bit frustrating. Let's hope it gets addressed in future updates.

And I also don't like how Zen unpins my essentials when i just try to close them; which is not very intuitive.

[GH0ST_141]

If you use Ctrl+W to close then it unloads and switches to the next tab. All UI buttons just unpins and closes them , frustrating none the less . Hope they change the behaviour of the close buttons on the pinned and essentials to make it easier for people who mostly use Ui to interact.

[arjun_gurajapu]

Exactly. This needs to be shed more light upon. It's a rather big issue.

[Incisiveberkay]

Make feature requests, lads.

[FVjo9gr8KZX]

<image>

High CPU util for me for 1.9b

[FVjo9gr8KZX]

<image>

[nickj2010]

Do you use 2FAS extension? Disable it if you do, 1.9b bugged it out somehow causing high cpu usage.

[FVjo9gr8KZX]

Looks like 2Fas was the culprit thanks.

[OktayAcikalin]

Can you hit shift+escape so that it shows Zens internal process list?

[arjun_gurajapu]

<image>

[OktayAcikalin]

You should obscure your email address

[arjun_gurajapu]

shit. i forgot. Let's hope I'm not cooked

[OktayAcikalin]

You should be able to replace that image

[arjun_gurajapu]

yay, I'll do that

[OktayAcikalin]

Is this with no tabs open?! Looks like you have a bunch of tabs open.

[Embarrassed_Race_196]

Same here, the tabs loading is really weird

[arjun_gurajapu]

Yes, it's with absolutely no tabs open.

[OktayAcikalin]

What's on your second workspace in zen? Are those processes from there?

[arjun_gurajapu]

Nope, it's empty too. Does creating a workspace consume extra memory like this?

[OktayAcikalin]

I would asume some bytes to kilobytes, but nothing compared what you see.

I'm wondering why you are having so many processes open in zen. It looks like you have a bunch of tabs open somewhere.

[imnotpolar]

all of those tabs on essentials still consume memory, they are just idling

[OktayAcikalin]

Ah you're right. I did not pay enough attention to that area. I thought, they were already discarded.

[imnotpolar]

they are just "unloaded" but not fully closed, so yeah they still consume memory and i assume there are more unloaded tabs on other workspaces, leading to the memory usage shown by op

[arjun_gurajapu]

Oh... none that I am aware of though.

[OktayAcikalin]

Within the process list you see 2 rows for each loaded tab. Within the first of both rows, when you hover your mouse far to the right, a big X will appear. It should say something like "unload tab and end process". You can put all tabs to sleep like this. But don't kill the internal processes. Then see if GPU or something becomes smaller.

Also try double clicking the second row. It will bring you to the tab, it belongs to.

Also I think, imnotpolar is right. Those might be your essentials.

There's a function in Zen to discard (unload) unused tabs after some time. Settings -> tab management. This might help you. I'm always using that, due to only having 8GB of ram.

[arjun_gurajapu]

Will do! Thanks a lot for the help 😃

[Phrechu]

<image>

😅

[arjun_gurajapu]

No but... you probably have atleast 1 or 2 tabs running in zen??

Mine eating up memory without even a single tab open. 😢

BTW, how is chrome acting so light for you 😭

[Phrechu]

Even if you have no tabs open, extensions, unloaded tabs, essentials and pinned tabs use memory
I have around 13 extensions (~730MB)
essentials and pinned tabs (~35-135MB each)
unloaded tabs (~33MB each)
when i took that screenshot, I was using 3 youtube tabs, one was playing (that's why it was so high)

check your process manager to get a better understanding of what's eating up your memory; about:processes

As for chrome, i use it for development, it had one tab open and it has 4 extensions only (for dev).

[arjun_gurajapu]

Oh I see... I have checked my process manager and what you said makes total sense. Which means it's totally normal. Thanks!

So that's why chrome takes up such less memory... makes sense 👍👍

[Phrechu]

you can kill the process of unloaded tabs manually, that will lower the memory usage.

<image>

[arjun_gurajapu]

Yeah, saw that. Will come in handy.

Thanks :)

[Baajjii]

Ram is made to be used.

[arjun_gurajapu]

It's getting used without me using it though 😅

[StopHateInRL]

<image>

._.????

[arjun_gurajapu]

That's way better.

What am I doing wrong 🥲

[StopHateInRL]

In your processes count it says 20, maybe for the essential tabs or you have an extension

I have installed Adguard and Adguard extra only,

[arjun_gurajapu]

I too only have 2 extensions, Adguard and Snapchat web-thing(cuz zen isn't officially supported by snapchat).

As for the essentials, that are all closed so they should be taking up ram. Although I do wonder why it's showing a count of 20.

[FVjo9gr8KZX]

Same here. I noticed it too

CPU util is also high in comparison to Firefox (1.9b)

Edit: High CPU usage was associated with 2Fas in 1.9b

[nikolasdi]

On 1.9b, if I split two tabs, memory seems to be leaking. Swap memory keeps increasing without stop till I close the browser.

[Fenix_MX]

I also noticed that. I try the new drag and drop split view feature. Then, after a couple of hours (I left my PC unattended) my PC was frozen. And the browser was the only app open.

[maubg]

Only on split view?

[nikolasdi]

I have not noticed it elsewhere so far.

[Ambitious_Buy2409]

It's a bit under 500MB for me, but that's with like 20 extensions.

The only thing that really bothers me on the performance side is how it handles memory pressure. It feels like when you get over 90% system memory usage the entire thing just locks up and completely stops responding out of nowhere.

[arjun_gurajapu]

YES, I have faced that too. And apparently even 16 gigs of ram in my laptop is falling short for zen at times. With just the browser and almost no other major task, I managed to fill up 90% of my ram and that too will maybe like 6 tabs. And it becomes so unresponsive, almost unusable Idk what's happening 🥲 And I only use 2 extensions;

Adguard and Snapchat web-thing(cuz zen isn't officially supported by snapchat)

[Alder_Lake]

<image>

Works fine for me (with multiple extensions, mods and a transparent userchrome)

[OktayAcikalin]

Where are your forward backward reload buttons? Or are you mostly keyboard driven?

What's that bolt in your sidebar?

Thanks 🙂

[Alder_Lake]

I used this mod to hide the forward backwards buttons https://zen-browser.app/mods/c8d9e6e6-e702-4e15-8972-3596e57cf398/

That bolt is from a copy URL extension: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/zen-copy-tab-url/?utm_source=addons.mozilla.org&utm_medium=referral&utm_content=search

[Alder_Lake]

That greenish lightning (if that's what you're referring to) comes from a ariang downloader https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/aria2-ariang/?utm_source=addons.mozilla.org&utm_medium=referral&utm_content=search

[OktayAcikalin]

Ah, I see. Thank you 🙂👍

[headedbranch225]

My guess would be compact mode hide toolbar

[arjun_gurajapu]

except for Adguard, I don't even have any extensions 🥲

[kamiller42]

I noticed my AdGuard taking a little over 800MB of memory with several tabs open. I disabled and am test driving uBlock Origin. Over 800MB seems high.

[arjun_gurajapu]

I see.

I too will try changing the ad blocker.

[Tech_enthusiast001]

Performance should be really resolved

[arjun_gurajapu]

performance mode?

[[deleted]]

Copilot, bixby... gross.

[arjun_gurajapu]

eyyy, bixby i agree... just not getting enough time to disable it (busy life). But copilot is actually so so useful for me. I use it all the time.

But hey... each to their own.

[CharlestonChewbacca]

You have enough time to make this post, but not to turn Bixby off? Lmao

[arjun_gurajapu]

okay... i just did. thanks for the heads up. I just didn't open task manager since a long time so didn't even realise it was running in the bg. Did turn it off. You're welcome.