Memory management is a critical function of an operating system or application that controls and optimizes how memory (RAM) is allocated, used, and freed. It ensures that applications have the necessary memory resources to function efficiently while preventing memory leaks or system crashes due to insufficient memory.

Memory management involves several key activities: allocation, where memory is assigned to processes or applications; deallocation, where memory is freed when no longer in use; and garbage collection, which automatically reclaims unused memory in managed languages like Java and C#.

There are two primary types of memory management: manual and automatic. In manual memory management, developers are responsible for explicitly allocating and freeing memory, as seen in languages like C and C++. In automatic memory management, the system handles these tasks, often through garbage collection.

Efficient memory management is crucial for application performance and stability, particularly in systems with limited resources, like embedded devices, or applications with high memory demands, like databases and real-time systems.