This read-only object reports the average number of processes that were running or ready to run on the device during the most recent one-minute interval, providing a snapshot of short-term CPU utilization and system load. A value of 4 means an average of 4 processes were active during that minute; values higher than the number of CPU cores indicate the system is overloaded. A system administrator uses this metric along with 5-minute and 15-minute averages to diagnose performance bottlenecks and determine when the device needs load balancing or additional capacity.