Note: If a lesser amount of memory is specified and vice versa, the optimization will be faster. However, if a higher amount is specified, Memory Optimizer for Windows 10 will take longer to free up that much memory space. Startup and Optimization – Using this option provided by Memory Optimizer you can clear the clipboard data to free more. Make your computer automatically clear RAM cache memory-Follow these easy steps to free cache memory on your system-1. Download EmptyStandbyList on your computer. Choose a particular place and then click on “Save” to save the application. Close the browser window. Click on the Search box beside Windows icon and type “Task Scheduler.

While we know that the more RAM your computer utilizes to improve multitasking, the better (for productivity). Many users want to be in control of how RAM is allocated to various processed.

You might have encountered stutters or observed the sluggish performance of your computer when you’re low on RAM, so, it is sometimes important to know how to free up RAM and optimize it to make the most out of your computer memory.

Should You Upgrade Your RAM?

Should you simply add more RAM? Yes, and no. To answer the question, you have to analyze how your memory is being utilized.

The next easiest way to test your memory is with Windows 10's built-in Memory Diagnostic tool. Search for 'Windows Memory Diagnostic' in your start menu, and run the application. Once we run the app, memory use in our Linux distro grows and so does our WSL 2 VM’s memory in Windows. Then we free the in-use memory, and the ‘vmmem’ process which powers your WSL 2 VM shrinks back down in size, meaning that freed memory is now back on your Windows host, and ready to be used in other applications! You can easily view the amount of video RAM you have in Windows 10 by following these steps: Open the Settings menu by pressing Win + I. Select the System entry, then click Display on the left sidebar. Scroll down and click the Advanced display settings text at the bottom.

The first thing you have to check- Is your RAM being used for all the necessary applications? If yes, you need that to make the most out of your computer – for better multitasking.

If you are not sure about that- we shall help you investigate and potentially fix it using the solutions that we shall discuss below.

How To Free Up & Lower Your RAM Usage?

1. Simply Perform A Restart

The easiest option to fix something on Windows is to just perform a reboot. Sometimes there are a lot of processes running and it is practically impossible and time-consuming to close them all – so it is better to just restart and have only the startup items show up in the background.

2. Get Rid Of Unwanted Programs

Sometimes we have several background processes running for applications that we may never use.

For instance, I had a VPN client installed – which I did not bother using. However, I always found a couple of background processes running associated with the VPN program.

So, navigate through the Settings -> Apps simply uninstall and remove the programs that you do not use – just to be sure that you do not have to deal with unnecessary background processes.

3. Use Applications That Are Light On System Resources

Just like Google Chrome, there are certain apps on Windows known to consume a lot of RAM to work. In that case, you can find lighter alternatives that could potentially lower the RAM usage on your computer.

You might find a “lite” edition or something simpler which should consume less memory. For instance, I could choose to utilize Firefox over Google Chrome which proves to consume less RAM – in my use-case.

Or maybe use something interesting like Opera GX which lets you limit the RAM usage for your browser. It is worth noting that you are concerned about a privacy-oriented browser, Opera may not be the best option.

4. Monitor RAM Usage

Even though you do not have anything unnecessary installed – you still observe a huge chunk of memory being utilized.

Sometimes an app consumes a lot of memory as part of its abnormal behavior. A recent update to the app could be a cause or maybe it is because of an extension that you just added to it which made things worse.

You cannot be so sure about that. Hence, you need to manage and monitor the RAM usage regularly to see what consumes the memory and keep things in check.

5. Use A ‘Game Booster’ Software To Suspend Processes While Gaming

Applications like Razer Cortex shall help you suspend all the unnecessary background processing before launching a game. So, you can have more RAM available dedicated to your game. While this may not make a big difference always – it is still worth a try. For some, it can be incredibly helpful.

6. Scan For Rogue or Malicious Process/Program

Even with an Antivirus program, you can have a malicious process consuming your system memory. It may not be possible to always spot the malicious process.

So, to get rid of such unwanted programs and processes, you can simply run a scan using AdwCleaner by Malwarebytes. If there’s something that bypassed your Antivirus, this is mostly going to help you get rid of it. Either way, it does not cost you anything to try the tool – so why not?

7. Minimize Startup Programs

A very small tweak that you can perform by just going to the Task Manager and head on to the Startup section. You should disable the programs that you do not need to be launched at startup.

In this way, you will have fewer programs running when you boot into your system. And, if everything else is perfect, you should have a lower RAM usage.

Wrapping Up

So, these are some of the best solutions that you can follow to free up some RAM. If you are still short on RAM after following our methods to optimize the usage, you probably need to add another RAM stick or maybe completely upgrade the RAM sticks that are compatible with your motherboard.

We hope this should help you optimize the RAM usage on your PC. Happy Computing!

Filed in . Read more about Productivity.

Don't worry if your computer gets stuck and Windows Task Manager warns 'High memory usage'. On this page, we will guide you to easily fix high memory usage issue in Windows 10/8/7 with the following resolutions:

What is High Memory Usage?

High Memory Usage is a state that Windows computers' RAM, ROM, or Cache usage grows to an extremely high level. Windows 10 high memory usage error is related to RAM and virtual memory.

When the PC has a high memory usage error, it will freeze while running a program and pops up an error message, warning that 'Your computer is low on memory'.

Follow to check if you are having this error and what caused high memory usage.

Define High Memory Usage Windows 10 Error:

Try the following steps to define if your computer is with high memory usage, high CPU, or high disk usage error:

Step 1. Press Ctrl + Alt + Del keys and select 'Task Manager'.

Step 2. At the Process tab, check the usage state of CPU, Memory, and Disk.

If the Memory column displays 70%, 80%, 90%, or 99% used as the two figures shown below, it's a 'High Memory Usage' issue.

High Memory Usage in Processes:

High Memory Usage in Performance:

Symptoms and Causes of High Memory Usage:

So what will happen when your computer is caught with a high memory usage issue? And what causes this error? Check it out.

10 Fixes for High (RAM) Memory Usage Issue in Windows 10

So how to fix 'high memory usage' or 'High RAM memory usage' issues? How do I reduce or fix the high memory usage in Windows 10?

Here is a list of all tested fixes, just follow to fix high memory usage Windows 10 issues immediately:

If you are having a similar problem in older Windows OS, like Windows XP, you can also give these fixes a try.

Method 1. Close Unnecessary Running Programs/Applications

When your computer is with high memory usage, you can try to close some unnecessary running programs and applications to fix this issue.

Step 1. Open Task Manager by right-clicking on the Windows icon and select 'Task Manager'.

Step 2. Go to the process tab, find the running programs that are taking high memory but you don't need it at all.

Step 3. Click the unnecessary programs and select 'End Task'.

Method 2. Disable Programs Running from Startup

Disabling programs running from Startup will effectively decrease the system load and saving quite a lot of CPU memory space.

Step 1. Press Ctrl + Alt + Del keys, select 'Task Manager'.

Step 2. Click on 'Startup' in Task Manager, right-click the applications that you don't want to run from Startup, and select 'Disable'.

Method 3. Defragment Hard Drive & Adjust for Best Performance

It will also help to save quite a lot of memory space by defragmenting hard drives. You can also refer to a manual way to defrag and optimize the disk for its best performance.

Defragment hard drives:

Step 1. Press 'Windows + R', type: dfrgui, click 'Defragment and Optimize Drives' to open this app.

Step 2. Click on the hard drives (C: drive for example) you want to defragment and click 'Optimize'.

Wait for the process to finish the defragment process. Do remember to restart the computer when the process completes.

Adjust for the best performance:

Step 1. Right-click 'This PC' and select 'Properties'.

Step 2. Click 'Advanced system settings', click 'Settings' under Performance.

Step 3. Check 'Adjust for best performance', click 'Apply' and 'OK' to confirm.

Method 4. Fix Disk File System Error

File system error is a major reason that may cause high memory usage or high CPU usage on Windows 10/8/7 computers. Professional partition manager software - EaseUS Partition Master can easily fix the error and get rid of it from your PC. It's easy for all levels of Windows users.

Check and Fix System Error

Method 5. Increase Virtual Memory

Virtual memory makes use of part of disk space to serve as memory so as to release computer memory stress. Therefore, when your computer is with high memory usage issue, you can try the following steps to increase virtual memory:

Step 1. Right-click on This PC, select 'Properties'.

Step 2. Click 'Advanced system settings' in the pop-up window.

Step 3. Go to the Advanced tab, click 'Settings...' under the Performance section.

Step 4. Navigate to the Advanced tab, click 'Change' under the Virtual memory section.

Step 5. Uncheck 'Automatically manage paging file size for all drives'.

Step 6. Select C drive, check 'No page file', and click 'Set'.

Step 7. Click 'Yes' to continue.

Step 8. Select a non-system partition, check 'Custom size', and set the same value in Initial Size and Maximum Size.

The value size is recommended to be twice big as the physical memory on your computer.

Step 9. Click 'Set' and 'OK' to save the changes.

Method 6. Disable Superfetch Service

Step 1. Press Windows + R, type services.msc into the Run box and click 'OK'.

Step 2. Locate and right-click 'Superfetch' > select 'Properties' > click 'Stop' on the pop-up windows.

Step 3. Click 'Disabled' from the 'startup type' drop-down menu.

Method 7. Set Registry Hack

This method will release some virtual memory on your computer by deleting page files in the Registry. Here is how to do so:

Step 1. Press Windows + R keys, type regedit to open the Registry Editor.

Step 2. Navigate to: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/SYSTEM/CurrentControlSet/Control/Session Manager/Memory Management.

Step 3. Find and right-click ClearPageFileAtShutDown, select to modify its value to '1' and click 'OK'.

Method 8. Increase Physical Memory

Logically, when your computer is with a high memory usage issue, you can add a new memory card to your computer so to extend the physical memory.

Windows 10 Free Up Ram Memory

You need to first check out the memory type by referring to the parameters of memory on your computer. Here is how to increase a physical memory on your PC:

Step 1. Check the physical memory size: Right-click on This PC and select 'Properties'.

Step 2. Open Task Manager and go to the Performance tab, click 'Memory'.

Step 3. Check out the speed, size of the memory to decide which type you'll need.

Step 4. Then purchase a new memory card, add it to your PC.

After adding the new memory to your computer, restart the PC and it will automatically detect the new memory.

Method 9. Disable NDU in Registry

Note: EaseUS technical support experts say this method may affect the usage of internet connection.

If you would like to try, here are the steps:

Step 1. Type regedit in Windows Search and click Registry Editor to open it.

Step 2. Go to: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/SYSTEM/ControlSet001/Services/Ndu.

Step 3. Right-click on the Start DWORD and select 'Modify'.

Step 4. Change its value to 4, click 'OK' to save the changes.

After this, restart your PC and the high memory usage issue should be resolved.

How To Free Up Ram

If your computer internet connection gets disabled, we suggest you repeat the steps and change the Start word value back to the previous number - 2.

Method 10. Clean Up Virus

Sometimes, virus infection or malware may also take up high usage of memory on your PC. The best way out is to run antivirus software on you PC to clean up all existing virus, and malware immediately:

Step 1. Download and install anti-virus software on your computer.

Step 2. Run the anti-virus software and choose to scan your whole computer drive.

Step 3. Select to clean up all found virus or virus-infected files or devices.

Bonus Tips: How to Avoid High Memory Usage Issue on Windows 10

After you fixing Windows high memory usage on Windows 10/8/7, some of you may want to know how to prevent this issue from happening again.

Here, we'll offer tips to protect your Windows 10 computer from this issue.

How to Avoid High Memory Usage in Windows 10 - Tips

Here are some tips that you can follow to avoid high memory usage issues in Windows 10/8/7. See how to set your computer with the best performance:

1. #1. Add a big enough memory card to the PC
2. #2. Run virus cleaner regularly
3. #4. Disable unnecessary programs from Startup
4. #5. Release virtual memory from hard drive
5. #6. Fix file system error and defrag hard drive regularly

You May Also Interest In:

Some of you may also want to know how to define High CPU or High Disk Usage errors. Here are the steps'

Step 1. Hold Ctrl+Alt+Del keys, click 'Task Manager'.

Step 2. On the Processes tab, check the Memory or the Disk usage state:

• The CPU column reaches up to 99% or even 100%, it's a 'High CPU Usage' issue. Refer to Fix 99% or 100% High CPU Usage for help.

• The Disk column shows high usage or even displays 100%, it's a 'High Disk Usage' issue. Follow to fix this problem.

Take Action, Keep Your Computer from High Memory Usage Issue

On this page, we provide tips to help you define whether your computer has high memory issues. And we also collected 10 practical fixes to resolve high memory usage Windows 10 error, and listed tips to help you avoid this issue.

Besides managing RAM and virtual high memory usage issues, we also suggest you apply EaseUS disk management software to make your computer running smoothly again. EaseUS Partition Master helps to manage partitions, make full use of disk space and optimize disk performance to the best state.

Now it's your turn. Take action and keep your computer from the high memory usage issue, making it running smoothly again.