[lawnchair_larry]

Overcommit does not use or require swap. You can have overcommit enabled on linux and not be using swap at all.

[wmf]

But then you may meet the OOM killer.

[lawnchair_larry]

Again, that has nothing to do with swap being enabled.

[wmf]

My understanding is that swap would delay or prevent the OOM killer from kicking in. Is that wrong?

[lawnchair_larry]

If you have 8GB of ram and 8GB of swap, the OOM killer will kick in at 16GB.

If you have 16GB of ram, and 0GB of swap, the OOM killer will kick in at 16GB.