When it says X amount of GB Available at bottom of your Finder window

[levmc]

Is that after Swap used or before swap used as shown in activity monitor?

 

[Dave Braine]

Doesn't Swap refer to memory as in RAM rather than space on your hard drive?

 

[chscag]

Swapped memory does take up hard drive space. I believe that's what @levmc is asking.

In my experience, the amount of drive space that is reported by the Finder does include the space taken up by the swap file.

 

[Dave Braine]

Swapped memory does take up hard drive space.

Thanks. Didn't know that.

 

[Nermal]

Thanks. Didn't know that.

In a nutshell, it's memory that's been "swapped" to the hard drive.