# Understanding Memory Estimates in Output Files

**URL:** <https://discourse.abinit.org/t/understanding-memory-estimates-in-output-files/3691>\
**Category:** Ground state\
**Created:** [April 9, 2025, 5:18pm UTC](https://discourse.abinit.org/t/understanding-memory-estimates-in-output-files/3691 "2025-04-09T17:18:13Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Dom\_7](https://discourse.abinit.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/7bcc69/32.png) [@Dom\_7](https://discourse.abinit.org/u/Dom_7)\
**Post date:** [April 9, 2025, 5:18pm UTC](https://discourse.abinit.org/t/understanding-memory-estimates-in-output-files/3691/1 "2025-04-09T17:18:13Z")

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I had a general question regarding the memory analysis shown in the ABINIT output files. For example, in the following case, I observed the memory estimates for two datasets:

# Dataset 1(GS):

# P This job should need less than 51.350 Mbytes of memory. Rough estimation (10% accuracy) of disk space for files : \_ WF disk file : 1611.951 Mbytes ; DEN or POT disk file : 0.502 Mbytes.

Biggest array : cg(disk), with 22.3902 MBytes.  
memana : allocated an array of 22.390 Mbytes, for testing purposes.  
memana: allocated 51.350Mbytes, for testing purposes.  
The job will continue.

# Dataset 2 (RF):

# P This job should need less than 607.920 Mbytes of memory. Rough estimation (10% accuracy) of disk space for files : \_ WF disk file : -825.248 Mbytes ; DEN or POT disk file : 0.502 Mbytes.

Biggest array : cg(disk), with 159.5178 MBytes.  
memana : allocated an array of 159.518 Mbytes, for testing purposes.  
memana: allocated 607.920Mbytes, for testing purposes.  
The job will continue.

My understanding is:

For Dataset 1, if I run on a single core and allocate ~100 MB of memory, that should be sufficient.

For Dataset 2, if I run on a single core and allocate ~1 GB of memory, that should also be sufficient.

Is this correct?

Also, are these estimates per core or for the total job (across all MPI tasks)?

I’d appreciate any clarification on this — especially how to properly allocate memory for multi-core jobs based on these memory estimates.

Thanks!  
Dominic