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Why Does My Vultr Compute Instance Have High CPU or RAM Usage??

Updated on 15 September, 2025

Explains causes and solutions for unexpected high CPU or RAM usage on Vultr Compute instances.

Validated on 26 Feb 2021 • Last edited on 19 Oct 2022

High CPU or RAM usage typically originates from applications or system processes running within the instance, not from the underlying hypervisor or physical host.

If you're noticing degraded performance, log in to your instance and identify the processes consuming excessive resources using command line tools like:

console 
$ top
$ htop
$ ps aux --sort=-%mem | head

You can stop or restart problematic services to stabilize your instance.

Important
If your instance frequently reaches its CPU or RAM limits during normal workloads, consider resizing to a larger plan from the Vultr Customer Portal.