Ever tried to figure out exactly how much memory each Chrome tab is using? You’re not alone. In this article, we’ll guide you through three easy ways to check each tab’s memory usage in Chrome. It helps you identify memory-hogging tabs and close them to improve performance.
View Tab Memory Usage in Hovercard
In a recent update (v118), Chrome added memory usage information to its hovercards. To find out how much memory a tab is using, simply mouse over it. You’ll see the memory usage displayed at the bottom of the hovercard.
If you don’t see the memory usage information, it might be disabled in Chrome flags. To enable it, copy & paste chrome://flags/#memory-saver-memory-usage-in-hovercards into the address bar and press Enter. Next, select Enabled from the “Show memory usage in hovercards” dropdown and click Relaunch.
Using Chrome’s Built-In Task Manager
Chrome has a built-in task manager that shows the memory footprint of each tab. Additionally, it also shows memory usage by the installed extensions and other background processes related to Chrome.
Start by pressing Shift + Esc to open Chrome’s task manager. Alternatively, click on three vertical dots at the top-right corner of your Chrome window, navigate to More tools, and then choose Task Manager.
In the task manager, look under the Task column to identify individual tabs and check the Memory Footprint column to see each tab’s memory usage.
By default, Chrome’s Task Manager displays memory usage in KB (Kilobytes). To convert this to MB (Megabytes), simply divide the number by 1024. For instance, if a tab shows a memory footprint of 113,600 KB, dividing it by 1024 results in approximately 111 MB.
Using the Browser’s URL
In the Chrome browser, type chrome://system/ into the address bar and press Enter. Locate the mem_usage_with_title entry and click on the Expand button next to it. It shows the memory use of all open tabs individually, as well as Chrome extensions and background processes.
If you’re wondering, this is essentially the same information displayed in Chrome’s Task Manager but presented in a raw, unfiltered format.
There it is, the three promised ways to view memory usage by tabs in Chrome. Try them out to identify memory-hungry tabs.
