Firefox 65 features an improved “about:performance” page. In it, you can see approximately how much memory an extension is using.
To my surprise, the bitwarden browser extension is occupying upwards of 25MB of RAM when just a couple hundred small items are present in it’s database (no attachments or long strings).
Can this be optimized to be lower?
Note that if the tradeoff involves speed vs. memory use, I would generally prefer speed (within reason, of course).
BTW, after the browser is open for 5 minutes or so, I noticed bitwarden’s memory use drops to about 18MB. Still quite high, but notably lower than 25MB.
bit, if I’m not wrong, all the platforms are being reworked and re-written. We’ll have to wait for future reports.
Btw, I think 25 MB is a fair amount o memory to use. Does LP or any other password manager tend to use more than that? So far, BW has been working fine and nicely here.
@K0media Do you have a good link talking about all the platforms being reworked and re-written? I wasn’t aware of that.
I don’t have LP installed, but I can compare the size of bitwarden to uBlock Origin (which in some ways is comparing apples to oranges, but in some ways isn’t). uBo occupies about 6MB of RAM with over 100,000 filters loaded. And uBo occupies over 10X more RAM than most extensions. So I’m not sure what is reasonable, but 25MB seems awfully large.
I’ve mentioned this somewhere else in the forums, please check here:
Although you should keep in mind that Bitwarden is under constant development. There’s a lot of stuff going behind the scenes. I’d like to see them on the roadmap, but that’s still a long way to go. Kyle and his team got higher priorities. But I’m not afraid to tell that I’m pretty excited with the project so far and that I’ve migrated to it (probably) in the right time. I’m pretty satisfied with my decision so far.
EDIT: However, I guess you’re right about the memory consumption between uBlock and BW itself. We have to consider the constant sync and overall UI, though. Besides other hidden elements, etc, etc.
Nothing much that can be done for now, but sit and wait. Or even buy him a coffee, meanwhile.
EDIT2: Just re-enabled LP for a quick test and got a surprise:
Although it’s much more glitchy than BW. Anyway, 8 GB RAM can handle that easily. I tend to keep lots and lots of tabs open. Sometimes it slows down, but I tend to unload tabs for better experience.
