Mar 11, 2020 The app works efficiently in offering a quick way to check out the key performance data of Mac. For instance, you can use this app to check out several important performance defining things like CPU, network, disk, memory, and even battery. Though this notification center widget comes at $2.99, it’s worth the price considering the notable. I own 3 different Macs and each with different CPU configurations, Xeon 8 core Mac Pro it shows 16 bars one for each thread, and Dual core i5 Mac Mini it shows 4 bars for 4 threads and a 15 inch Macbook Pro with an i7 quad core and CPU LED shows all 8 threads this is a great feature but I have to say 16 little Bars on the 8 core Mac Pro forces.
This article describes some of the commonly used features of Activity Monitor, a kind of task manager that allows you see how apps and other processes are affecting your CPU, memory, energy, disk, and network usage.
Open Activity Monitor from the Utilities folder of your Applications folder, or use Spotlight to find it.
Overview
The processes shown in Activity Monitor can be user apps, system apps used by macOS, or invisible background processes. Use the five category tabs at the top of the Activity Monitor window to see how processes are affecting your Mac in each category.
Add or remove columns in each of these panes by choosing View > Columns from the menu bar. The View menu also allows you to choose which processes are shown in each pane:
- All Processes
- All Processes Hierarchically: Processes that belong to other processes, so you can see the parent/child relationship between them.
- My Processes: Processes owned by your macOS user account.
- System Processes: Processes owned by macOS.
- Other User Processes: Processes that aren’t owned by the root user or current user.
- Active Processes: Running processes that aren’t sleeping.
- Inactive Processes: Running processes that are sleeping.
- Windowed Processes: Processes that can create a window. These are usually apps.
- Selected Processes: Processes that you selected in the Activity Monitor window.
- Applications in the last 8 hours: Apps that were running processes in the last 8 hours.
CPU
The CPU pane shows how processes are affecting CPU (processor) activity:
Click the top of the “% CPU” column to sort by the percentage of CPU capability used by each process. This information and the information in the Energy pane can help identify processes that are affecting Mac performance, battery runtime, temperature, and fan activity.
More information is available at the bottom of the CPU pane:
- System: The percentage of CPU capability currently used by system processes, which are processes that belong to macOS.
- User: The percentage of CPU capability currently used by apps that you opened, or by the processes those apps opened.
- Idle: The percentage of CPU capability not being used.
- CPU Load: The percentage of CPU capability currently used by all System and User processes. The graph moves from right to left and updates at the intervals set in View > Update Frequency. The color blue shows the percentage of total CPU capability currently used by user processes. The color red shows the percentage of total CPU capability currently used by system processes.
- Threads: The total number of threads used by all processes combined.
- Processes: The total number of processes currently running.
You can also see CPU or GPU usage in a separate window or in the Dock:
- To open a window showing current processor activity, choose Window > CPU Usage. To show a graph of this information in your Dock, choose View > Dock Icon > Show CPU Usage.
- To open a window showing recent processor activity, choose Window > CPU History. To show a graph of this information in your Dock, choose View > Dock Icon > Show CPU History.
- To open a window showing recent graphics processor (GPU) activity, choose Window > GPU History. Energy usage related to such activity is incorporated into the energy-impact measurements in the Energy tab of Activity Monitor.
Memory
The Memory pane shows information about how memory is being used:
More information is available at the bottom of the Memory pane:
![App To Show Mac Cores Cpu App To Show Mac Cores Cpu](/uploads/1/2/6/1/126130043/231697649.jpg)
- Memory Pressure: The Memory Pressure graph helps illustrate the availability of memory resources. The graph moves from right to left and updates at the intervals set in View > Update Frequency. The current state of memory resources is indicated by the color at the right side of the graph:
- Green: Memory resources are available.
- Yellow: Memory resources are still available but are being tasked by memory-management processes, such as compression.
- Red: Memory resources are depleted, and macOS is using your startup drive for memory. To make more RAM available, you can quit one or more apps or install more RAM. This is the most important indicator that your Mac may need more RAM.
- Physical Memory: The amount of RAM installed in your Mac.
- Memory Used: The total amount of memory currently used by all apps and macOS processes.
- App Memory: The total amount of memory currently used by apps and their processes.
- Wired Memory: Memory that can’t be compressed or paged out to your startup drive, so it must stay in RAM. The wired memory used by a process can’t be borrowed by other processes. The amount of wired memory used by an app is determined by the app's programmer.
- Compressed: The amount of memory in RAM that is compressed to make more RAM memory available to other processes. Look in the Compressed Mem column to see the amount of memory compressed for each process.
- Swap Used: The space used on your startup drive by macOS memory management. It's normal to see some activity here. As long as memory pressure is not in the red state, macOS has memory resources available.
- Cached Files: Memory that was recently used by apps and is now available for use by other apps. For example, if you've been using Mail and then quit Mail, the RAM that Mail was using becomes part of the memory used by cached files, which then becomes available to other apps. If you open Mail again before its cached-files memory is used (overwritten) by another app, Mail opens more quickly because that memory is quickly converted back to app memory without having to load its contents from your startup drive.
For more information about memory management, refer to the Apple Developer website.
Energy
The Energy pane shows overall energy use and the energy used by each app:
- Energy Impact: A relative measure of the current energy consumption of the app. Lower numbers are better. A triangle to the left of an app's name means that the app consists of multiple processes. Click the triangle to see details about each process.
- Avg Energy Impact: The average energy impact for the past 8 hours or since the Mac started up, whichever is shorter. Average energy impact is also shown for apps that were running during that time, but have since been quit. The names of those apps are dimmed.
- App Nap: Apps that support App Nap consume very little energy when they are open but not being used. For example, an app might nap when it's hidden behind other windows, or when it's open in a space that you aren't currently viewing.
- Preventing Sleep: Indicates whether the app is preventing your Mac from going to sleep.
More information is available at the bottom of the Energy pane:
- Energy Impact: A relative measure of the total energy used by all apps. The graph moves from right to left and updates at the intervals set in View > Update Frequency.
- Graphics Card: The type of graphics card currently used. Higher–performance cards use more energy. Macs that support automatic graphics switching save power by using integrated graphics. They switch to a higher-performance graphics chip only when an app needs it. 'Integrated' means the Mac is currently using integrated graphics. 'High Perf.' means the Mac is currently using high-performance graphics. To identify apps that are using high-performance graphics, look for apps that show 'Yes' in the Requires High Perf GPU column.
- Remaining Charge: The percentage of charge remaining on the battery of a portable Mac.
- Time Until Full: The amount of time your portable Mac must be plugged into an AC power outlet to become fully charged.
- Time on AC: The time elapsed since your portable Mac was plugged into an AC power outlet.
- Time Remaining: The estimated amount of battery time remaining on your portable Mac.
- Time on Battery: The time elapsed since your portable Mac was unplugged from AC power.
- Battery (Last 12 hours): The battery charge level of your portable Mac over the last 12 hours. The color green shows times when the Mac was getting power from a power adapter.
As energy use increases, the length of time that a Mac can operate on battery power decreases. If the battery life of your portable Mac is shorter than usual, you can use the Avg Energy Impact column to find apps that have been using the most energy recently. Quit those apps if you don't need them, or contact the developer of the app if you notice that the app's energy use remains high even when the app doesn't appear to be doing anything.
Disk
The Disk pane shows the amount of data that each process has read from your disk and written to your disk. It also shows 'reads in' and 'writes out' (IO), which is the number of times that your Mac accesses the disk to read and write data.
The information at the bottom of the Disk pane shows total disk activity across all processes. The graph moves from right to left and updates at the intervals set in View > Update Frequency. The graph also includes a pop-up menu to switch between showing IO or data as a unit of measurement. The color blue shows either the number of reads per second or the amount of data read per second. The color red shows either the number of writes out per second or the amount of data written per second.
To show a graph of disk activity in your Dock, choose View > Dock Icon > Show Disk Activity.
Network
The Network pane shows how much data your Mac is sending or receiving over your network. Use this information to identify which processes are sending or receiving the most data.
The information at the bottom of the Network pane shows total network activity across all apps. The graph moves from right to left and updates at the intervals set in View > Update Frequency. The graph also includes a pop-up menu to switch between showing packets or data as a unit of measurement. The color blue shows either the number of packets received per second or the amount of data received per second. The color red shows either the number of packets sent per second or the amount of data sent per second.
To show a graph of network usage in your Dock, choose View > Dock Icon > Show Network Usage.
Cache
In macOS High Sierra 10.13.4 or later, Activity Monitor shows the Cache pane when Content Caching is enabled in the Sharing pane of System Preferences. The Cache pane shows how much cached content that local networked devices have uploaded, downloaded, or dropped over time.
Mac Pro Cpu
Use the Maximum Cache Pressure information to learn whether to adjust Content Caching settings to provide more disk space to the cache. Lower cache pressure is better. Learn more about cache activity.
The graph at the bottom shows total caching activity over time. Choose from the pop-up menu above the graph to change the interval: last hour, 24 hours, 7 days, or 30 days.
Learn more
- Learn about kernel task and why Activity Monitor might show that it's using a large percentage of your CPU.
- For more information about Activity Monitor, open Activity Monitor and choose Help > Activity Monitor. You can also see a short description of many items in the Activity Monitor window by hovering the mouse pointer over the item.
The CPU is the main unit of your computer whether you are using a Mac or an Android. It does all the heavy lifting when you are gaming or just browsing. If your system has more cores, it means it can handle more processes at the same time. This will improve the performance of your computer significantly. Knowing the number of cores inside your computer or mobile will help you understand and compare performance across different devices and hardware.
So, how do we know the number of cores inside Windows, Mac, Android or iOS devices? Each of this platform has a different way and we will be discussing all of them below. Pick your operating system and test it on your device now.
Let’s begin.
1. Find the Number of Cores in Windows CPU
If you are using a Windows computer then there are quite a few ways to know the number of cores running inside your CPU unit. Let’s take a look at a few of them.
The first method is the Task Manager method. Simply right-click on the Task Bar and select Task Manager from the menu. When the Task Manager opens, click on the Performance tab to find the number of cores running inside your Windows CPU computer.
Note the number of sockets which is usually only 1 in commercial computers meant for home users. If you have more than one socket, you can install another CPU converting your unit into a server. As you can see, my old Lenovo laptop has 2 cores with 1 socket.
Another and a much better way to find out the number of cores inside your CPU is a software. Download and install CPU-Z software. It is a freeware and comes with no ads. With CPU-Z, you will also discover the number of threads the cores employs, core speed, and so much more.
It is an advanced tool that must sit on every hard drive in the world. It is that good and the software is really lite with a small footprint in terms of resources.
To find the number of cores on your Windows computer using the command line, simply open cmd and type in the following command.
echo %NUMBER_OF_PROCESSORS%
Also Read:Best Windows Package Manager to Auto Update Apps
Apple Mac Cpu
2. Find the Number of Cores in Mac CPU
If you are using a MacBook, then you will need different software or apps to learn about the number of cores that power your laptops. I don’t know why Windows users call their laptops just laptops but Apple users don’t. They call it MacBook. Isn’t it the same? Too much branding? Anyways.
To find the number of cores running inside your MacBook, simply click on the ever-present Apple logo on the upper left corner of the screen. Once you do, you will see the option ‘About This Mac‘. Click on that to reveal a popup. Go to the Support tab and click on Specifications. Apple will redirect you to a web page on their site instead of displaying the info on your screen. In my case, I was redirected to this link for model MacBook Pro 13′ 2016 year.
Apple always did things their way and this time is no different, however, this doesn’t paint the complete picture. If you are looking for more in-depth information, press the Option key and go to Apple Menu > System Information. You can also use the Spotlight to find System Information. This is where you will see more info like the number of cores running, CPU, RAM, and so on.
It is good to see that such a tool is built right inside MacBook removing the need to download third-party software. Microsoft, take note.
Alternatively, you can type in the following command to quickly find the number of cores on your MacBook.
Also Read:Put Windows on MacBook Pro And iMac (7 Ways)
3. Find the Number of Cores in Android CPU
Today’s smartphones are really powerful. To give you some perspective of the same, let me share an amazing fact. Nasa once shared that Voyager 1 and 2, that were launched way back in the year 1977 to study our Solar System, had just 69.63 kilobytes of memory each. iPhone 5 came with 16GB memory which is 240,000 times more than that. iPhone 5 is now considered to be a vintage device. Pretty much dead. Question is, what are we doing with that much power in our pockets? Playing games and browsing social media? Just some thought for food.
The first app in the list is Hardware Info. As the name suggests, this nifty little app will collect all the information about what’s underneath your Android smartphone. Apart from the number of cores that are powering your smartphone, you will also learn a thing or two about display, processor, RAM, cameras, and sensors. A lot of useful information on a single screen neatly organized in expandable tabs. The app has no ads but comes with an in-app purchase that will let you compare hardware info of over 3500 Android smartphones.
App To Show Mac Cores Cpu Free
The second app is CPU-Z. Yes, it is from the same dev team who developed the software for the Windows OS that we discussed above. The layout is more refined and pleasant-looking but no dark theme here. CPU-Z will collect and display some additional information like individual core speed and performance as well. This way, you can understand the processor speed and make a better choice next time you are buying a smartphone.
Read:Best Android Quick Settings Apps to Customize It Like a Pro
4. Find the Number of Cores in iOS CPU
App To Show Mac Cores Cpu Download
iPhones are considered to be a premium lineup of smartphones and for good reason too. They look great, work smooth, and have an amazing shelf life. Most people never face issues like iPhone slowing down or needing reboots to function correctly or simply hanging down on users. If you are interested in knowing about the number of cores running inside your iPhone, download and install the Lirum app from the App Store.
Tap on the menu on the right to select This Device under which you will tap on CPU. This will reveal a drop-down menu that will share some critical information about your iPhone. In my case, the number of cores running on iPhone SE is 2. Yeah, I am still rocking the SE that runs iOS 12. Didn’t I say that Apple products have an amazing shelf life?
The lite version of the app is free to download and use and there is no need to upgrade to the pro version. If you are an advanced user and need more advanced features like the ability to compare device info and performance then the pro version will cost you $3.49 only.
Also Read:iPhone Not Sending Text Messages? Here are 12 Ways to Fix It
How Many Cores Does My Device Have
These were some of the best apps and software to find the number of cores powering your hardware. Whether you are using an Android, iOS, Windows or MacOS powered device, there is a way to find the core nature of your device.