Why is memory (rss) from ps command different than memory seen in top command?
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Here on MacOS Catalina, when checking the memory usage of a process I see that the
ps
command shows a RSS value which is different from the memory usage shown in top:
$> ps e -o command,vsize,rss,%mem|grep "myapplication"|head -n 1
myapplication 4594896 51364 0.3
**RSS -> 51364**
top
PID COMMAND %CPU TIME #TH #WQ #PORT MEM
48106 myapplication 115.7 09:06.12 69/1 1 101 37M+
**MEM -> 37M**
Why this difference?
**UPDATE:**
Another example with IntelliJ process:
top -pid 357
PID COMMAND %CPU TIME #TH #WQ #POR MEM PURG CMPRS PGRP PPID STATE BOOSTS %CPU_ME %CPU_OTHRS UID FAULTS COW MSGSENT MSGRECV SYSBSD
357 idea 2.6 03:16:46 112 1 925 4906M 0B 1583M 357 1 sleeping 0 0.00000 0.00000 281451937 28337096 54627 8404446+ 2733245+ 156093159+
Top shows **4906M**
ps aux
USER PID %CPU %MEM VSZ RSS TT STAT STARTED TIME COMMAND
xxxxxxx 357 3.6 14.5 180050484 2430728 ?? S 1:44PM 196:48.70 /Applications/IntelliJ IDEA.app/Contents/MacOS/idea -psn_0_73746
ps shows RSS **2430728** (KB)
Asked by codependent
(123 rep)
Mar 30, 2020, 12:01 PM
Last activity: Jul 26, 2025, 04:06 PM
Last activity: Jul 26, 2025, 04:06 PM