How to limit the memory usage of chrome on a Mac?

Question

I have 6 GB memory on my MacBook Pro but after some time I started Chrome, it ate up around 3-4 GB of my memory. Is there any way to limit the memory usage of Chrome?

P.S. for Mac, it seems there's no way to set the start-up arguments for Chrome, nor have a "purge memory" button in the task manager. So the usual ways for Windows don't apply for Mac.

Solution 1

Actually on a mac there is a nifty little command for the command line that will attempt to purge the unused inactive memory.

purge

I have run into the same problem. That is only a temporary fix though.

NOTE: When you enter it don't worry if it seems as if your comp froze, that is normal as far as I have noticed, and will go away once the purge program has finished.

Solution 2

Because of the way chrome forks a new process for each tab, it can report that its using more than its actually using. Some memory is shared between the chrome processes. Check the about:memory link in chrome, to see how much memory is actually being used.

Comments

[Simon Sheehan]

Are you running a ton of addons?

[slhck]

Macs are very different from Windows PCs in terms of memory management. Are you experiencing any performance problems? Which version of chrome do you have? How many tabs are open?

[Jay]

17.0.963.2, around 20 tabs and 10 plugins

[keen]

all purge does is wipe your in-memory disk cache. that disk cache automatically purges as needed. purge doesnt actually help with high memory consumption of apps such as chrome (or other memory leaks..)

[keen]

not to mention that this in no way addresses the question of "how to limit the memory usage".....