Memory usage is not comparable across Linux and Mac. MacOS is much better at avoiding swap, uses memory compression, shared frameworks etc. At the same time it tries to use all the memory available which makes direct system-wide comparisons not accurate. A good rule of thumb is that 8GB on Mac == 16GB on Windows/Linux.
MacOS does seem to “use all the ram” but never falls over itself.
I think the kernel is likely genuinely better in low memory conditions (its hard to be worse than Linux here to be honest) - and thats combined with being aggressive about using as much of the ram as there is available opportunistically. (not fully unloading applications when closing them for example).
“WindowServer” uses 2-3G of ram, and electron apps use lots too; but truthfully my macbook is able to sustain significantly more open programs than my linux laptop, despite my linux laptop actually having more memory. (32G vs 24G for the Mac).
I cant explain it and I am genuinely curious how this is the case, but at least anecdotally, parent is more correct than not.
