Question

What Linux distribution consumes less RAM?

Posted September 15, 2014 6.6k views

Hi all! I just installed LEMP (Nginx, PHP-FPM, MySQL) on Ubuntu 14 and Wordpress in my droplet of 512 mb ram. As i can see in “top” i consume almost memory (90%)

KiB Mem: 501880 total, 484296 used, 17584 free, 13436 buffers
KiB Swap: 0 total, 0 used, 0 free. 345056 cached Mem

Can it be Ubuntu? What linux distribution uses less ram?

(I have not installed plugins or web in wordpress only the installation, I have no views)

Thanks!!

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asb September 15, 2014

The stat that really shows what’s going on here is the 345056 cached Mem That accounts for the vast majority of your used memory. The Linux kernel will use any available memory for disk caching, unless it’s required by a running program. If needed by a program, the memory will be freed up. From the site Linux Ate My RAM:

Why does top and free say all my ram is used if it isn’t?

This is just a misunderstanding of terms. Both you and Linux agree that memory taken by applications is “used”, while memory that isn’t used for anything is “free”.

You would call that “free”, but Linux calls it “used”.

Memory that is You’d call it Linux calls it
taken by applications Used Used
available for applications, and used for something Free Used
not used for anything Free Free

This “something” is what top and free calls “buffers” and “cached”. Since your and Linux’s terminology differs, you think you are low on ram when you’re not.

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