htop command shows less memory usage than the mate-system-monitor for some reason. Please see below screenshot. Also the free command shows same number as htop.
Linux memory is a constantly changing variable as it tries to be most efficient with what's in RAM. It's likely the different libraries are calculating the usage differently.
Since the units can sometimes be a cause of confusion:
SI unit = 1 Megabyte = MB = (1000)^2 bytes = 1000000 bytes
IEC unit = 1 Mebibyte = MiB = (1024)^2 bytes = 1048576 bytes
According to man htop, htop uses the MiB units like MATE System Monitor does, so that clears that one.
Even by knowing the data, I haven't been able to crunch the numbers to conclude how exactly the programs differ, but I do know that MATE System Monitor does include the used space in tmpfs filesystems:
mount | grep tmpfs
(Probably should've used free -m instead of free -h here for more precise measurements - also showing a system load monitor that reports GB with the same value converted to MATE System Monitor's GiB)
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Makes sense. Thank you for the response.