Windows 11 26H2 used less RAM than Windows 11 25H2 in tests on an 8GB Acer Swift Air 14, with the difference most pronounced when the laptop was idle. The results suggest the newer version can leave more memory available, though demanding workloads still put pressure on an 8GB system.
The test compared Windows 11 25H2 (build 262000.7019) with 26H2 (build 26300.9711) on the same laptop, equipped with an Intel Core 5 320 processor, 8GB of LPDDR5x memory and a 512GB SSD. The tester used the same drivers and programs for both versions and left the page file unchanged.
About 10 minutes after startup, with no extra applications open, 25H2 was using 5.3GB of RAM and had 2.3GB available. Windows 11 26H2 used 4.1GB, leaving 3.5GB available.
With a typical selection of apps open—including 10 Edge tabs, Word, Slack and Spotify—memory use reached 7.0GB on 25H2 and 6.6GB on 26H2. The newer version also had more available memory, at 1,018MB compared with 563MB.
The gap remained under a heavier workload involving 20 Edge tabs and several other applications, including Excel, Photos and GIMP. Windows 11 25H2 used 7.3GB, while 26H2 used 6.8GB. The test also recorded substantially less committed memory on 26H2: 10.4GB compared with 15.2GB on 25H2.
Both versions experienced disk activity during the heaviest test as the system relied on virtual memory. The tester reported that the spikes were less severe on 26H2, but noted that such workloads can still bog down a laptop with 8GB of RAM.
Sources: Windows Central.