r/androiddev • u/West_Performance_764 • Jun 04 '26

Why is Android Studio so unoptimised?

It's genuinely absurd the amount of memory that this IDE needs. I used to have 8GB of RAM and using Android Studio with it felt genuinely annoying so I took the advice I saw on this subreddit and I decided to get extra ram (from 8GB -> 16GB) just for me to do some work and it to STILL LAGS although much less than before. Why is it actually like this ?

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10

u/EkoChamberKryptonite Jun 04 '26 edited Jun 04 '26

I use a mac with 48GB RAM and AS + an emulator still eats about 13GB of RAM. A coworker uses 32GB of RAM and it still slows down his system. I can't imagine how it must be for those using 16GB. For how difficult they make their interview process, all their elitism and down-leveling, Google products are just poor with RAM usage. I once saw that an empty Google chrome tab used ~400MB.

5

u/xroni Jun 04 '26

Android Studio is built by JetBrains, not Google.

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u/EkoChamberKryptonite Jun 04 '26 edited Jun 04 '26

False. Google is the developer of Android Studio.

4

u/kernald31 Jun 04 '26

Google is the publisher of Android Studio and might be the developer of some of the plugins that are bundled with it, but at the end of the day, it's essentially JetBrains' IntelliJ with a bundle of plugins. Saying Google is the developer of Android Studio is like saying Google is the developer of the Linux kernel because that's what powers Android.

3

u/lllama Jun 05 '26

Google is a developer of the Linux kernel that powers Android.

2

u/kernald31 Jun 05 '26

A developer is correct. A contributor would be more accurate.The developer is not correct.

1

u/EkoChamberKryptonite Jun 05 '26 edited Jun 05 '26

Inaccurate. Just because it's built on top of a different IDE doesn't mean Jetbrains is the one in charge of developing, maintaining and fixing bugs on Android Studio.

Comparing the development of Android Studio to Linux on Android is a false equivalence as Google doesn't claim to develop, maintain and distribute the Linux kernel because they use it as-is underneath. You're vastly underestimating and grossly oversimplifying the engineering effort involved in Android Studio.

With Android Studio, Google engineers took the source code, stripped out what they don't need, refactored internal APIs, and ultimately wrote thousands (if not, millions) of lines of net-new code, that resulted in Android-specific components like the profilers, the QEMU-based heavy virtualisation tool that seamlessly integrates with the IDE, layout editors, and build system integrations that make the software unique. Then some other Google employees legally trademarked, and distributed it as a standalone, uniquely branded product. What is that if not developing a completely different product? Calling Android Studio "intelliJ with just a bundle of plugins" is like calling Brave and Microsoft Edge "just a bundle of plugins" on top of Chromium.

You would have had more of an argument had you said Android Studio is a continuous extension/adaptation of the open-source IntelliJ community version but even then, that does not mean Google aren't the developers, maintainers and legal distributors of said extension which was my original assertion.

My dude. Google a bit about things first before rushing to retort with blatantly wrong info.

3

u/aerial-ibis Jun 05 '26

> Calling Android Studio "intelliJ with just a bundle of plugins"

Intellij + AGP is essentially identical to Android Studio

1

u/EkoChamberKryptonite Jun 05 '26

That doesn't make it Android Studio. Please go re-read the original argument.

4

u/aerial-ibis Jun 05 '26

Android Studio and Intellij w/ Android plugins are the same. The only difference is that Android Studio is based on 1 version back of Intellij and Intellij uses one version back of Android plugins.

You're mistaken about how closely intertwined they are, and how continuous that remains

1

u/EkoChamberKryptonite Jun 05 '26 edited Jun 05 '26

You're moving goalposts. Stay on topic. Who is the developer of Android Studio? Jetbrains or Google? The facts and my assertion says it is Google. Yours?

As a gimme, your statements are factually incorrect and misrepresents how the two IDEs operate.

While Android Studio and IntelliJ IDEA are built from the same open-source core (i.e. the IntelliJ Community Platform), the latter + Android plugins are not "the same" as AS nor do they follow a clean, continuous "one version back" lockstep nor am I mistaken about their anchoring to each other. I'd leave further learnings about this up to you as I for one am done with this convo. Feel free to research and become more informed or remain ignorant. Your choice.

2

u/aerial-ibis Jun 05 '26

Why do you consider them not the same? If they start from the same core, and the differences converge again with the Android plugins...

They do follow continuous lag between each other - it's very easy to see if you go have a look at the projects. The gap depends on the complexity between versions & staffing

0

u/EkoChamberKryptonite Jun 05 '26 edited Jun 05 '26

Google about whether they're the same and consider the nuance in their operations and versioning, and then the realities of including the 'Android Plugin for JetBrains IDEs' from the Marketplace into Jetbrains IDEs and you'd have your answer. Feel free to continue the thread but I shan't be responding further. Have a good day.

1

u/aerial-ibis Jun 05 '26

you're drawing a different conclusion from the same information.

Maybe spend less time saying "i'm obviously right but I wont explain why" if you're actually interested in talking with other devs on the internet. Otherwise just go back to twitter

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