Worried about excessive memory usage? Here’s how to check memory usage on Windows 10 and 11 to easily determine which application is using the most memory.
On any computer, memory usage is one of the important aspects to keep an eye on. This is especially true if you are running multiple heavy applications at once. When your system is low on memory, it may start to slow down, freeze, or crash. You may even experience the infamous “Blue Screen of Death” (BSOD) in extreme cases. Therefore, monitoring memory usage is crucial for any Windows system.
Thankfully, there are several ways in Windows to check RAM usage quickly. You can check the total memory usage, per app memory usage, and even check the memory usage using Command Prompt. Monitoring memory usage helps you diagnose performance issues and optimize your system.
So, without ado, let me show you how to find memory usage on Windows 10/11.
Table of contents:
- Check total memory usage using Task Manager
- Command to check memory usage (Command Prompt)
- Find per application memory usage
Check Total Memory Usage Using Task Manager
You can easily find the total memory usage on your computer using the built-in task manager application. Here’s how to do it.
- First, right-click on the taskbar to open the taskbar menu.
- Click on the Task Manager option in the taskbar right-click menu.
- Go to the Performance tab in the Task Manager.
- Click on the Memory option in the Performance sidebar.
- You will see the total memory usage under the “In use (Compressed)” heading.
Note: If you don’t see tab names in the Task Manager, click on the three stacked horizontal lines menu icon (hamburger icon) on the top-left corner of the window. It will show the sidebar tab names.
Command To Check Memory Usage
You can also use the Command Prompt or PowerShell to check total memory usage. Specifically, available free memory. This is especially useful if you want a quick and easy way or to create scripts.
Note: The below command method shows the total free memory. When subtracting it from the total available physical memory, you get the total memory usage.
- First, right-click on the Start icon or press Win + X to open the power user menu.
- Select the Terminal option in the power user menu to open Windows Terminal. Windows 10 users can open Windows PowerShell.
- In the Terminal/PowerShell window, type systeminfo | find “Available Physical Memory” and press Enter on your keyboard.
- The command shows the total free memory.
- To find the total memory usage, subtract this value from the total physical memory.
- That’s it. It is that simple to find the memory usage using Command Prompt.
Find per Application Memory Usage
Just as you can find the total memory usage, you can also find per-application memory usage. This is helpful in finding applications with high memory usage. If you find an unnecessary application with high memory usage, you can just kill the process and free memory.
Here’s how to check memory usage per application:
- First, right-click on the taskbar to open the taskbar menu.
- Click on the Task Manager option in the taskbar right-click menu to open Task Manager.
- Go to the Processes tab in the Task Manager window.
- You will see per-application memory usage under the Memory column.
- To applications with the most memory usage, click on the Memory column header.
- As soon as you do that, all the processes are rearranged from highest to lowest memory usage.
- As you can assume, the top most applications in the list are using the most memory.
Note: If you don’t see tab names in the Task Manager, click on the three stacked horizontal lines menu icon (hamburger icon) on the top-left corner of the window. It will show the sidebar tab names.
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That is all. It is that simple to check total memory usage, find available free memory, and check per-application memory usage.
I hope this simple and easy Windows how-to guide helped you.
If you are stuck or need help, send an email, and I will try to help as much as possible.
