What is the tuned daemon and what does it do?

tuned is a daemon that applies a profile of kernel/hardware settings to optimize the system for a workload — e.g. a server, a VM, or a laptop on battery.

Rather than hand-tuning dozens of low-level knobs (CPU governor, disk scheduler, network buffers), you pick a named profile and tuned applies a coherent bundle of settings tested for that scenario. Profiles come in static (set once at boot) and dynamic (monitors load and adjusts live) flavours. It's standard on RHEL/Fedora-family systems; tuned-adm is the control tool, and tuned-adm recommend even suggests a profile based on detected hardware.

Two tuning modes:

• Static: Set once at boot, doesn't change
• Dynamic: Monitors system and adjusts in real-time

Installation and activation:

dnf install tuned
systemctl enable --now tuned

Profile categories:

• Power saving: Reduce energy consumption
• Performance: Maximize throughput/responsiveness

Key commands:

Example:

tuned-adm active
# Current active profile: virtual-guest

tuned-adm profile throughput-performance
tuned-adm active
# Current active profile: throughput-performance