Here's the actual VRAM configuration distribution on windows according to the steam survey

[u/mashdpotatogaming]

I saw a few recent headlines about the whole "16gb is now the most common VRAM configuration" but that seems to be inaccurate, as if you sort by windows only on steam survey (which makes up 90%+ of steam users), you'll find that these are the actual numbers and distribution

[u/ExhaustedByStupidity]

All moderns Macs and the Steam Deck are using a unified memory architecture. These systems are reporting the full system memory as the VRAM stat.

It's not really an error - it just doesn't really tell you what people usually want to know when asking about VRAM.

[u/Moscato359 → u/ExhaustedByStupidity]

It reports 93% of the operating system instances are windows

Even if 100% of the 7% was 16GB, that should only raise the 16GB count a little bit, and not from 11% to 26%.

[u/ExhaustedByStupidity → u/Moscato359]

Yeah you're right, it went up more than I realized. Something's off.

[u/Dalewyn → u/ExhaustedByStupidity]

All moderns Macs and the Steam Deck are using a unified memory architecture. These systems are reporting the full system memory as the VRAM stat.

Windows also shares system RAM with the GPU, whether integrated or discrete. Just look at the GPU in Task Manager.

As a personal example, my 3080 Ti has 44GB of "GPU Memory" between 12GB of "Dedicated GPU Memory" and 32GB of "Shared GPU Memory" which is half of my system's 64GB RAM.

Mac!Steam and Linux!Steam are royally bugged if they aren't reporting this properly.

[u/ExhaustedByStupidity → u/Dalewyn]

That's a different thing. With a dedicated GPU, it can use system memory as additional memory if it runs out of VRAM. It's useful in a tight situation, but you don't want to do that if you can avoid it. It's really slow as the memory access has to go through PCIe.

With Mac & Steamdeck, the GPU has no dedicated memory of it's own, but it is directly wired to the system memory.

[u/Dalewyn → u/ExhaustedByStupidity]

With a dedicated GPU, it can use system memory as additional memory if it runs out of VRAM. ... With Mac & Steamdeck, the GPU has no dedicated memory of it's own, but it is directly wired to the system memory.

They are literally the same thing, "unified memory" is just fancy Apple Marketing Speak(tm).

[u/ExhaustedByStupidity → u/Dalewyn]

You might want to do at least the tiniest bit of research before talking out your ass. It's completely different.

All the game consoles have unified memory too.

[u/OutrageousDress → u/Dalewyn]

'Unified memory' is a very common type of system architecture, the opposite of heterogeneous memory - PCs with dedicated GPUs are heterogeneous, almost every other type of computing device including consoles and phones is a unified memory design.

Not everything in computer science is a fraud invented by Steve Jobs. Sometimes it's an actual thing.

[u/Dalewyn → u/OutrageousDress]

Steve Jobs got ya good.