9

According to TaskManager on W7, Skype is using 72Mb of memory. I'm not in a call or anything - it's just logged in.

Is this anything to care about?

Improve this question
6
  • 2
    72MB of memory isn't high usage. This sort of usage for Skype is perfectly normal.
    – Ramhound
    Mar 18, 2014 at 10:52
  • Are you talking about physical memory? Commit size? Virtual memory? What exactly did you measure?
    – David Schwartz
    Mar 19, 2014 at 4:17
  • 9
    I have the same question, but mine is soaring above 550mb (private working set), with 1.1gb commit size. Don't really want to make a new question, however the current best answer is useless to me.
    – AnnanFay
    May 1, 2014 at 19:53
  • @Ramhound There's nothing 'normal' about 72MB of RAM. It's a lot. The MySQL and OpenLDAP servers run in half that, and believe me they do a lot more than Skype.
    – user207421
    Oct 15, 2015 at 1:29
  • 1
    My skype was using 1 Gig of ram on friday.
    – Wes
    Jun 21, 2020 at 9:39

5 Answers 5

Reset to default
4

I've found two things to have helped lower the unreasonable, and inefficient memory usage of Skype:

  • Turn off emoticon animations (or emoticons altogether)
    • Options > IM > Turn off emoticon animations
  • Display only contact names without pictures
    • Options > Contacts List > Contact name only

My Skype–running on a corporate computer for company use–consistently uses >500MB of physical memory, this being the base value with no message threads actually open. When I have several threads open, with a long history in each, it can increase by 200MB easily.

Most of this memory usage seems to be due to the long (corporate) contact lists and Skype buffering of the conversation history, profile images, and active threads, but that's just a guess.

Improve this answer
2

No, it isn't. This is a perfectly normal value. Unless a program is not meticulously optimized for memory usage, that is.

Improve this answer
7
  • 4
    As a software developer, that's not true. Even though it's not a lot in relative terms, it is a lot for a program that's not doing anything. When I look in Task Manager, Skype is the 4th biggest in memory usage - using 3X more than DropBox or explorer.exe.
    – Mr. Boy
    Mar 18, 2014 at 13:50
  • 1
    It's not universally true. Still, when using a not-so-light GUI framework, these values are nothing out of the ordinary. I have Chrome running at several hundreds of megabytes, Firefox at roughly 600 MB – even Explorer is using 140 MB. Skype is in no way comparable to Dropbox.
    – Daniel B
    Mar 18, 2014 at 14:50
  • 1
    This isn't a very useful answer for people who arrive here from search engines (see my comment to main question). If this is the correct answer the question sounds too localised. When the question is broadened this answer becomes useless.
    – AnnanFay
    May 1, 2014 at 19:58
  • @Annan Well, your problem is obviously not the problem this question is about, then.
    – Daniel B
    May 1, 2014 at 23:54
  • 1
    Yes it is something to care about. My Skype is presently using 205MB, which is nearly as much memory than Firefox which has a dozen tabs over and is rendering hundreds of windows controls and fonts. It is second top of the list and 95% of the time it is doing nothing except showing a single window and some text and a couple of images. This answer is absurd.
    – user207421
    Oct 15, 2015 at 1:24
2

Skype will be creating resources for every profile in your contact list (photos especially can eat up ram), your own profile and any history about that it keeps, creating buffers for handling connections, buffers for histories of conversations, etc.

The exe is 20 meg alone, and generally a lot of memory systems in there will need to allocate some basic workspace once they initialise, even if that subsystem isn't getting used.

Looking at it, I'd say its using more than it needs but not enough that they wanted to waste time optimising for memory usage.

EDIT - Also, if its creating a lot of windows and user interfaces that are just hidden, that can escalate the memory usage dramatically. Skype has a LOT of functionality your probably not accessing.

Improve this answer
3
  • 1
    Any chance I could disable the unused functionality? This answer sounds right, but if it provided some hints regarding solution, it would even be useful.
    – Tomáš Zato
    Jan 8, 2015 at 21:11
  • Oh diddums. So does Firefox or IE and they do aeons more than Skype.
    – user207421
    Oct 15, 2015 at 1:29
  • Sorry, I don't know of anything you can do to reduce the memory usage in Skype.. memory usage is generally not a priority on desktop applications (or even mobile these days) due to the accessibility of ram. Compared to how much your browser will eat up with a couple of open pages, Skype should be the least of your problems...
    – James Podesta
    Jan 26, 2016 at 8:17
1

The problem is that Skype is using P2P connection typology, hence the application needs to use some users as relay nodes or super nodes to host the connections between other users. This issue happens when your computer is so powerful that the program chooses you to host the connections.

To solve this issue, all what you have to do is delete the routing table file to renew it. You can do that in Windows, as follows:

  • Quit Skype entirely. You can do that by right clicking the Skype icon in the system tray next to the clock (bottom right of your screen), then select Quit.
  • Press on your keyboard Windows button plus R.
  • Type in the run box C:\Users\\AppData\Roaming\Skype
  • Delete the file shared or shared.xml, not shared.lck
  • Start Skype again.

In a Mac, you can delete the same file as follows:

  • Quit Skype. Right click Skype in the Dock, then choose Quit.
  • Go to home > Library > Application support > Skype.
  • Delete the shared.xml file.
Improve this answer
5
  • 1
    It appears this answer is a bit spammy
    – J Mac
    Mar 18, 2014 at 11:51
  • Can you provide any sources that confirm your relay nodes theory? I don't see any reason to use relay nodes in a P2P communicator. Avoiding intermediate nodes is the entire point of P2P. AFAIK Skype supernodes exist, but they are dedicated servers run by Skype/MS, not computers of users.
    – gronostaj
    Mar 18, 2014 at 12:14
  • 5
    What is spammy about it?
    – Mr. Boy
    Mar 18, 2014 at 13:51
  • @gronostaj If both ends of a P2P connection are behind a firewall, then an intermediate node is required. I agree in thinking that MS shut all the 3rd party supernodes down a while ago, though.
    – Darth Android
    Mar 18, 2014 at 14:12
  • @Mr.Boy It was an advertisement for finding jobs.
    – Wes
    Jun 21, 2020 at 9:44
0

72mb is a perfectly reasonable amount. I long for the days where it only used that much. I've seen skype use over 2gb's of memory. It's awful.

Improve this answer

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .