Gigabytes for AI: hides Apple Intelligence memory consumption on the Mac?

Apple has been trying to make his AI system Apple Intelligence tasty for a long time. In the beginning it was even very difficult to activate it, the technology is now automatically started on supported systems, or even reactivates when installing updates. And it is also increasingly deeply anchored in the operating systems. But there are also reasons not to use Apple Intelligence: be it data protection fears or the fact that you will find little worthwhile in the scope of functions. Another reason to choose against Apple Intelligence, which will appear in German in April: it eats a lot of storage space. And that is exactly what Apple seems to hide, users report the latest beta versions of MacOS 15.4.

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As the software leak expert @aarop613 writes on x, Shows MacOS 15.4 Beta 3since this week available, no longer individually in the system settings under storage space, which Apple Intelligence occupies. In earlier MacOS versions, under the total memory occupancy of MacOS, there was a sub-point that made it possible to identify the Apple intelligence share by clicking on the information icon.

It still looked like a mistake in earlier Betas from MacOS 15.4 as if it were a mistake, this seems to want Apple: “I think that was not a bug,” writes @aarop613. MacOS 15.4 is not yet finished, possibly Apple is still making a decision.

20 GB, but for what?

Apple was once proud that MacOS only took up a comparatively little SSD place had even sought to reduce the consumed memory from the main version to the main version. Apple Intelligence now changes that. It ensures that the AI ​​system is switched on that the Gigabyte-heavy models operated. For example, under MacOS 15.3.1 on a test Mac that were almost 4.8 GB. Interestingly, these packages do not necessarily disappear immediately after switching off Apple Intelligence.

On the same computer, the overall occupancy of macOS with and without Apple Intelligence initially remained at almost 20 GB, a value that usually commutes without the AI ​​system by 15 GB or below. A restart may help so that the space is released again. The turning off is also – at least psychologically – made it more difficult: Apple has a red warning dialogue in MacOS 15.3 if you do this.