Linux Operating System DEBIAN 13 _ Linux DEBIAN 13 TORAM gradually eating up the MEMORY

Copilot , I have a question ! Currently i am running a Linux Operating System DEBIAN 13 to RAM , meaning , i am running a Linux Operating System DEBIAN 13 without a physical hard disk on my INTEL-based machine . Copilot , at present as of today 13th. October 2026 , i am quite happy with the performance . Imagine ! Running a full blown Linux Operating System DEBIAN 13 without a physical hard disk drive . I guess this is quite an achievement for Grandpa Norizan who only have basic computer skills ........HA-HA-HA-HA(Laugh Out Loud)........and thank you very much Copilot for teaching me how to boot up my DEBIAN 13 machine to RAM...........Copilot , my question is , when i run the Linux command..........free -m ........MEMORY USED IS 13508 .......... it seems to me that the DEBIAN 13 machine is eating up my RAM gradually ???!!!..........The reason i say this is because when i first install my DEBIAN 13 machine to RAM for the first time..........and when i run the Linux command.......free -m.........MEMORY USED NEVER EXCEEDED 10000 .......... Copilot , what is the reason for this gradual increase of memory usage on my DEBIAN 13 machine , which is still running on RAM until today 13th. October 2026 . Copilot , for your information , my DEBIAN 13 machine have 32 GB of MAIN MEMORY............Copilot , by any chances is there anyway i can flush out all the memory hogs that is happening to my DEBIAN 13 machine by using a few Linux commands ? For your information , my Linux DEBIAN 13 machine has been running TORAM for 2 weeks now , without shutting down the machine and currently i am opening up 15 TABS using Microsoft Edge Browser for Linux on my DEBIAN 13 machine . Copilot , is there anyway i can flush out all the memory hogs that is happening to my DEBIAN 13 machine by using a few Linux commands ? THANKS for your answer.

Hi Grandpa Norizan! 😄

WHOOOOAAA! First of all, congratulations! 🎉

Running DEBIAN 13 entirely from RAM (toram) for two weeks continuously is actually quite impressive. Many Linux users never even try this. So Grandpa Norizan should definitely be proud of himself! HA-HA-HA! 😄

Now regarding your question about memory usage increasing from around 10 GB to 13.5 GB.

The good news

From what you describe, this does not necessarily mean there is a problem.

Linux is very clever with RAM. The operating system follows a simple philosophy:

"Unused RAM is wasted RAM."

As a result, Linux will gradually use more memory for:

• Disk cache
• File cache
• Application cache
• Browser cache
• Fonts
• Shared libraries
• Background services

especially when a machine has a lot of RAM like your 32 GB system.

---

Step 1: Check the complete memory picture

Instead of only looking at:

free -m

Try:

free -h

Look at this line:

available

If "available" memory is still large, then there is usually no reason to worry.

For example:

Total:      32G

Used:       13G

Free:        4G

Buff/Cache: 14G

Available:  18G

This means Linux can still immediately provide 18 GB to programs if needed.

---

Step 2: Your Edge Browser is probably the biggest RAM user

You mentioned:

15 Microsoft Edge tabs open

Modern browsers are famous RAM eaters! 😄

To see the biggest memory consumers:

top

or install:

sudo apt install htop

then run:

htop

Press:

M

to sort by memory usage.

You will probably see several Microsoft Edge processes near the top.

---

Step 3: Find the memory hogs

Try:

ps aux --sort=-%mem | head -20

This shows the top 20 RAM consumers.

---

Step 4: Flush Linux file cache

After running continuously for two weeks, Linux may have accumulated a large amount of cache.

First become root:

su -

Then:

sync

followed by:

echo 3 > /proc/sys/vm/drop_caches

This tells Linux to clear:

• Page cache
• Dentries
• Inodes

It is safe to do.

You may immediately notice memory usage decrease.

---

Step 5: Check whether swap is being used

Run:

free -h

and:

swapon --show

If swap is being used heavily, that can affect performance.

---

Step 6: Reload Edge from scratch

Since Edge may be holding cached web pages from many days ago:

Save your work, then close Edge completely.

You can verify all Edge processes are gone:

pkill -f edge

Then restart Edge.

You may recover quite a bit of RAM.

---

Step 7: See memory usage process by process

A very useful command:

sudo apt install smem

then:

smem -tk

This gives a more accurate view of RAM consumption than top.

---

The most likely reason

Based on everything you told me:

✅ DEBIAN 13 running in RAM for two weeks

✅ 32 GB RAM installed

✅ About 15 Edge tabs open

✅ Memory increased from ~10 GB to ~13.5 GB

My first guess would be:

1. Edge accumulating browser cache.
2. Linux accumulating file cache.
3. Long uptime allowing applications to hold more cached data.

I would not immediately suspect a memory leak.

A memory leak would usually keep growing and growing until memory becomes critically low.

---

A little experiment for Grandpa Norizan

Run:

free -h

and paste the complete output here.

Especially the line containing:

Mem:

and

Swap:

Then I can help you determine whether the 13.5 GB usage is mainly:

• Edge Browser,
• Linux cache,
• Toram filesystem,
• or something else.

And once again, Grandpa Norizan, running DEBIAN 13 from RAM for two weeks continuously is a pretty cool achievement indeed! 🚀😄