Ask HN: Dear GitHub the browser memory sucks

8 points by bojo 1 year ago | 6 comments
I've gone through 3-4 Firefox upgrades in Linux over the last several months and have consistently watched GitHub tab memory balloon out from 1gb to 30gb+ each and every time. At first I thought it may have been a Firefox or distribution bug, but only GitHub blows things up so bad.

Why is this so terrible? I don't use other browsers so perhaps a Firefox only bug? Do they check this?

Have had a couple friends confirm, but HN community? Thoughts?

  • Raed667 1 year ago
    On a macbook+firefox: when viewing small repositories Github is around 250-350MB

    When viewing a large PR (+200 files, 2k additions/deletions) Github is around 780MB

    • Zelphyr 1 year ago
      Seems trite but, my honest answer is that Github is owned by Microsoft. I saw the same thing happen to LinkedIn after that acquisition.
      • eimrine 1 year ago
        I don't even have a 30GB of RAM, can I have a github link which is too bad for 16GB computer?
        • vinhnx 1 year ago
          I missed the old plain GitHub UI. circle 2011-2012 when I first learn git. GitHub struck me a the best developer-friendly UI out there. Nowadays it seems bloated with too many (unwanted, for me) features.
          • KomoD 1 year ago
            What are you viewing on Github for that to happen?
            • jerrygoyal 1 year ago
              I tend to avoid visiting the site for example i prefer vscode github pr extension for code reciews