Other RAM on iPhones

[dayloon]

Hi All

Apologies if this is a stupid question.

I'm a long term Android user who has become a bit fed up of the android eco-system so am planning to move back to Apple after many years away. I plan on buying the iPhone 14 Pro Max and an apple watch (already ordered).

But i'm a bit concerned about the RAM. On Android even low/mid range phones have 8GB RAM. I wouldn't even look at an android phone if it has less than that. Most flagships now come with 12GB or even 16GB RAM. Yet the iphone "flagship" has 6gb. This kinda worries me.

But i understand it's not just a numbers game and has more to do with how the OS and Apps utilise the RAM available.

Is 6GB ram on an iphone really enough for intensive apps/games and multi-tasking?

 

[white_horse]

I’ve never had memory issues on an iPhone. With the iPhone you just need to worry about having enough storage space (256gb, 512gb, etc). I’ve been on the iPhone since the 2nd or 3rd generation. I’ve done web browsing, games, video editing, photo editing all without memory issues.

 

[Andeddu]

I’ve never had memory issues on an iPhone. With the iPhone you just need to worry about having enough storage space (256gb, 512gb, etc). I’ve been on the iPhone since the 2nd or 3rd generation. I’ve done web browsing, games, video editing, photo editing all without memory issues.

Apps will auto-shutdown regularly when not in use due to RAM constraints on an iPhone though. It’s not a big problem for me as I don’t have 1000 tabs open at once along with a multitude of apps running simultaneously in the background.

 

[sjperformance]

Concern? iOS doesn't require 12-16 gb of ram to perform smooth. In my years of iPhone use I've yet to experience any ram issues. People really make this a bigger deal than it should be. I stopped caring and worrying about ram on iPhones many years ago.

 

[eyoungren]

Hi All

Apologies if this is a stupid question.

I'm a long term Android user who has become a bit fed up of the android eco-system so am planning to move back to Apple after many years away. I plan on buying the iPhone 14 Pro Max and an apple watch (already ordered).

But i'm a bit concerned about the RAM. On Android even low/mid range phones have 8GB RAM. I wouldn't even look at an android phone if it has less than that. Most flagships now come with 12GB or even 16GB RAM. Yet the iphone "flagship" has 6gb. This kinda worries me.

But i understand it's not just a numbers game and has more to do with how the OS and Apps utilise the RAM available.

Is 6GB ram on an iphone really enough for intensive apps/games and multi-tasking?

Just use the phone. You're going to see about 3 to 5 upgrades of iOS, depending on how long Apple continues to support the 14. RAM really only starts to matter around that time or later when the phone actually becomes out of date.

At that point, depending on how and when you upgrade, it isn't going to matter as you might not even have the phone anymore.

The idea behind the iPhone is that you don't have to worry about this stuff.

 

[Dovahkiing]

If I recall correctly, android apps are all written in JavaScript and are executed inside of a VM within the Android OS itself. This is how an Android developer can write/publish an App and have it run on a whole slew of different hardware platforms, as long as they're all running a version of Android. Apple on the other hand knows exactly what hardware all their iOS apps will need to run on. So, unlike Android, iOS apps don't run in a VM - they're compiled for each specific hardware variant and run natively. I think this extra overhead is a big reason Android phones need more RAM.

Add to that - and as mentioned - iOS/macOS in general are better (or more aggressive) at managing/allocating RAM to apps. As an example, if Chrome asks the iOS kernel for 1GB+ of RAM, the kernel just says "no" and kills the app.

 

[dayloon]

Thank you for the replies. I was aware it wasn't just about the numbers but more how it's used. But I feel reassured now