MySQL is using swap memory while I have plenty of free RAM I have a 6 GB buffer pool size for my database; however, mysqld process is moving to swap while there is plenty of RAM available. I think pool size and pages along with pool of reads and pool of read requests should be tuned to avoid such situation.

Below is my current configuration:

[fuad@damra mysql]$ free -m
         total       used       free     shared    buffers     cached
Mem:          7872       7138        734          0        304        678
-/+ buffers/cache:       6155       1717
Swap:        32767        456      32311


mysql&gt; SHOW GLOBAL STATUS LIKE 'innodb_buffer_pool%';
+---------------------------------------+-------------+
| Variable_name                         | Value       |
+---------------------------------------+-------------+
| Innodb_buffer_pool_dump_status        | not started |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_load_status        | not started |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_pages_data         | 316153      |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_bytes_data         | 5179850752  |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_pages_dirty        | 20          |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_bytes_dirty        | 327680      |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_pages_flushed      | 51645307    |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_pages_free         | 75279       |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_pages_misc         | 1776        |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_pages_total        | 393208      |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_read_ahead_rnd     | 0           |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_read_ahead         | 0           |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_read_ahead_evicted | 0           |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_read_requests      | 26268346860 |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_reads              | 496         |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_wait_free          | 0           |
| Innodb_buffer_pool_write_requests     | 207971337   |
+---------------------------------------+-------------+

mysql&gt; SHOW VARIABLES LIKE 'innodb_buffer_pool_%';
+-------------------------------------+----------------+
| Variable_name                       | Value          |
+-------------------------------------+----------------+
| innodb_buffer_pool_dump_at_shutdown | OFF            |
| innodb_buffer_pool_dump_now         | OFF            |
| innodb_buffer_pool_filename         | ib_buffer_pool |
| innodb_buffer_pool_instances        | 8              |
| innodb_buffer_pool_load_abort       | OFF            |
| innodb_buffer_pool_load_at_startup  | OFF            |
| innodb_buffer_pool_load_now         | OFF            |
| innodb_buffer_pool_size             | 6442450944     |
+-------------------------------------+----------------+


Do I need to tune these values to achieve better results and to not let MySQL switch to swap disk unless RAM is fully utilized?

This is a dedicated database server holding two MySQL schemas. Both schemas are serving the same application (one schema is to store statistics).

I can't change swappiness as this is not an option for the VMware administrator. As for RAM, I have 734+678 (cached memory can be re-used).

I have Java installed on this server to serve the JDBC driver between my application and MySQL.

Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server release 6.7 (Santiago).
Innodb_buffer_pool_pages_free / Innodb_buffer_pool_pages_total shows about 15% free. Given the low number of dirty pages and the very low Innodb_buffer_pool_reads vs Innodb_buffer_pool_reads_requests you probably could trim your buffer_pool size.

Innodb_buffer_pool_pages_free == 0 is perfectly acceptable if you aren't reading from disk frequently (low Innodb_buffer_pool_reads).