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Lucas Aimaretto
Asked: 2019-03-20 06:11:46 +0800 CST

Swap space not being released

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I have ubuntu server 16.04.5 and I notice that some swap space has been assigned some time ago, but is not being released.

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Is there anything I should do? Or eventually it will be freed? How can I check which process(es) is(are) using it?

Thanks!

server swap 16.04

1 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    Basically you should just leave it alone - Your system has decided that some portions of memory are not needed right now, and moved them to swap to free up memory for programs and data which are being used.

    When (if) the memory in the swap area is needed, the OS will pull that memory back from swap into RAM, possibly moving other parts into swap to make room if needed.

    There is good basic information about handling swap at https://help.ubuntu.com/community/SwapFaq

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