Inactive?

The Sun is at the peak of its 11year cycle where magnetic activity in particular plays a large part in sunspot origination. It is true that there are fewer spots than expected and they are not as active as they could be. However when you read about the Sun being unusually 'quiet' in the popular press, bear in mind that it is consuming something in the order of 600 million tons of hydrogen per second and converting it into helium. Depends on what you call quiet in your neck of the woods!