16GB is the sweet spot for my usage.
I'm coming from an M1 MBA with 16GB RAM and 512GB storage and which actually served me fine. I've used it mainly for Web browsing, MS Office, Citrix, Zoom, WebEx, Teams, Quicken and some light SW development. I don't do heavy graphics nor video editing. I run multiple applications simultaneously without noticing any slowdowns and I transfer-in my data files temporarily when I travel without running out of storage.What is your usage? I was thinking of going 36GB with the upgraded M3 Pro 12CPU/18GPU.
I always go custom and max out specs to future proof as much as possible but the extra 20GB
RAM is quite expensive...is it worth it–that's the question Im tussling with.
I have a similar use case as you. Just light daily usage such as Internet browsing, movie/music streaming and watching MKV files, communication apps like WhatsApp and Discord, work apps like Zoom and TeamViewer, and some productivity apps like Microsoft Office. No gaming or anything intensive. With this use case, do you think 18 GB RAM will be sufficient for the next 5 years?I'm coming from an M1 MBA with 16GB RAM and 512GB storage and which actually served me fine. I've used it mainly for Web browsing, MS Office, Citrix, Zoom, WebEx, Teams, Quicken and some light SW development. I don't do heavy graphics nor video editing. I run multiple applications simultaneously without noticing any slowdowns and I transfer-in my data files temporarily when I travel without running out of storage.
I made the jump while my MBA still has decent trade-in value and because the battery health was beginning to dip into the low 80%. Aside from the improvements from an M1 to an M3 Pro and then from an MBA to an MBP, I also gain at least two years of future proofing. I will also be doing more SW development using Xcode and I figure 18GB should still be good.
It's hard to know if our use cases won't somehow change and become more memory intensive in the next 5 years. However, barring that occurrence, I think 18GB is sufficient. I don't expect any of the applications that I currently run on the MBP will suddenly become memory hogs. Of course, YMMVI have a similar use case as you. Just light daily usage such as Internet browsing, movie/music streaming and watching MKV files, communication apps like WhatsApp and Discord, work apps like Zoom and TeamViewer, and some productivity apps like Microsoft Office. No gaming or anything intensive. With this use case, do you think 18 GB RAM will be sufficient for the next 5 years?