...even surpassing it's theorically maximum possible allocation.

[OK] Maximum possible memory usage: 7.3G (46% of installed RAM)

There is not actually a way to calculate maximum possible memory usage for MySQL, because there is no cap on the memory it can request from the system.

The calculation done by mysqltuner.pl is only an estimate, based on a formula that doesn't take into account all possible variables, because if all possible variables were taken into account, the answer would always be "infinite." It's unfortunate that it's labeled this way.

Here is my theory on what's contributing to your excessive memory usage:

thread_cache_size       = 128

Given that your max_connections is set to 200, the value of 128 for thread_cache_size seems far too high. Here's what makes me think this might be contributing to your problem:

When a thread is no longer needed, the memory allocated to it is released and returned to the system unless the thread goes back into the thread cache. In that case, the memory remains allocated.

^{http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.6/en/memory-use.html}

If your workload causes even an occasional client thread to require a large amount of memory, those threads may be holding onto that memory, then going back to the pool and sitting around, continuing to hold on to memory they don't technically "need" any more, on the premise that holding on to the memory is less costly than releasing it if you're likely to need it again.

I think it's worth a try to do the following, after first making a note of how much memory MySQL is using at the moment.

Note how many threads are currently cached:

mysql> show status like 'Threads_cached';
+----------------+-------+
| Variable_name  | Value |
+----------------+-------+
| Threads_cached | 9     |
+----------------+-------+
1 row in set (0.00 sec)

Next, disable the thread cache.

mysql> SET GLOBAL thread_cache_size = 0;

This disables the thread cache, but the cached threads will stay in the pool until they're used one more time. Disconnect from the server, then reconnect and repeat.

mysql> show status like 'Threads_cached';

Continue disconnecting, reconnecting, and checking until the counter reaches 0.

Then, see how much memory MySQL is holding.

You may see a decrease, possibly significant, and then again you may not. I tested this on one of my systems, which had 9 threads in the cache. Once those threads had all been cleared out of the cache, the total memory held by MySQL did decrease... not by much, but it does illustrate that threads in the cache do release at least some memory when they are destroyed.

If you see a significant decrease, you may have found your problem. If you don't, then there's one more thing that needs to happen, and how quickly it can happen depends on your environment.

If the theory holds that the other threads -- the ones currently servicing active client connections -- have significant memory allocated to them, either because of recent work in their current client session or because of work requiring a lot of memory that was done by another connection prior to them languishing in the pool, then you won't see all of the potential reduction in memory consumption until those threads are allowed to die and be destroyed. Presumably your application doesn't hold them forever, but how long it will take to know for sure whether there's a difference will depend on whether you have the option of cycling your application (dropping and reconnecting the client threads) or if you'll have to just wait for them to be dropped and reconnected over time on their own.

But... it seems like a worthwhile test. You should not see a substantial performance penalty by setting thread_cache_size to 0. Fortunately, thread_cache_size is a dynamic variable, so you can freely change it with the server running.

First all take a look at the InnoDB Architecture (courtesy of Percona CTP Vadim Tkachenko)

InnoDB

Your status for the Buffer Pool says

Buffer pool size 1310719

That's your Buffer Size in Pages. Each page is 16K. That turns out 20G - 16K.

Please note the the following: You pushed data into the InnoDB Buffer Pool. What changed ?

Buffer pool size   1310719 
Free buffers       271419 (It was 347984)
Database pages     1011886 (Is was 936740)
Old database pages 373510 (It was 345808)
Modified db pages  4262 (It was 0)

Also, note the difference between the Buffer Pool Size in Pages.

1310719 (Buffer pool size) - 1011886 (Database pages) = 298833

That's 298833 InnoDB pages. How much space is that ???

mysql> select FORMAT(((1310719  - 1011886) * 16384) / power(1024,3),3) SpaceUsed;
+-----------+
| SpaceUsed |
+-----------+
| 4.560     |
+-----------+

That's 4.56GB. That space is used for the Insert Buffer Section of the InnoDB Buffer Pool (a.k.a. Change Buffer). This is used to mitigate changes to nonunique indexes into the System Tablespace File (which all have come to know as ibdata1).

The InnoDB Storage Engine is managing the Buffer Pool's internals. Therefore, InnoDB will never surpass 62.5% of RAM. What is more, the RAM for the Buffer Pool is never given back.

WHERE IS THE 70.2% OF RAM COMING FROM ???

Look back at the output of mysqltuner.pl at these lines

[OK] Maximum possible memory usage: 22.6G (82% of installed RAM)
Key buffer size / total MyISAM indexes: 2.0G/58.7M
[--] Total buffers: 22.2G global + 2.7M per thread (151 max threads)

mysqld has three major ways of allocating RAM

• You set 20G of the InnoDB Buffer Pool
• You have 2G for MyISAM Key Cache
• The remaining 0.6G comes from 151 (max_connections) times (2.7M per DB Connection or thread). The 2.7M comes from (join_buffer_size + sort_buffer_size + read_buffer_size)

Any small spike in DB Connections will raise RAM past the 62.5% threshold you see for InnoDB.

MyISAM (Side Note)

What catches my eye is

Key buffer size / total MyISAM indexes: 2.0G/58.7M

Since you have so little indexes for MyISAM. You could set the key_buffer_size to 64M.

You do not need to restart mysql for that. Just run

SET GLOBAL key_buffer_size = 1024 * 1024 * 64;

Then, modify this in my.cnf

[mysqld]
key_Buffer_size = 64M

This will give the OS 2GB of RAM. Your VM will simply love you for it !!!

Give it a Try !!!

CAVEAT

Running FLUSH TABLES on InnoDB tables simply closes files against the .ibd files. This will not really push changes directly. The changes have to migrate its way through the pipes of InnoDB. This is why you see the spike in Modified db pages. The 4262 changed pages (66.59 MB) gets flushed when InnoDB's scheduless its flush.