20 Ways to Fix a Slow Mac

If your Mac is running slow here are 20 things you can do to try to fix it. Learn how to check memory pressure, see what is running in the background, and how you should be using apps and browsers to make things faster.

Comments: 15 Responses to “20 Ways to Fix a Slow Mac”

    Nancy Bircher
    1 year ago

    When checking my IMac memory, I saw quite a few "disnoted" using 452 KB. What is this? Thank you

    1 year ago

    Nancy: That's a system notification process. 452 KB is a very tiny amount of memory. Don't worry about it.

    Bart Pulverman
    1 year ago

    Gery,

    For me, this is one of the most timely and useful presentations you have made and has allowed me to make a noticeable performance for my 27" mid-2017 iMac.

    Thank you!

    Christian Nelson
    1 year ago

    Gary...you always present so much helpful information, but you have outdone yourself this time. Thanks so much.

    Lindy
    1 year ago

    This an incredible and comprehensive video .... deserves a Webby!!! Thanks so much for all you do to keep our Macs purring. 👍

    Jenny
    1 year ago

    Gary - Thankyou - a brilliantly useful article. I shall store it for future use. I'm glad to say my checks showed nothing wrong - YET! Jenny

    Umesh Kumar
    1 year ago

    Does Dropbox as a cloud backup slow rage Mac?

    Umesh
    1 year ago

    No "rage Mac"but iMac.

    1 year ago

    Umesh: I don't think Dropbox has a backup service. Note that a standard cloud service is NOT a backup. Time Machine is a backup. Backblaze is a backup. Cloud drives are not backups. Seehttps://macmost.com/icloud-is-not-a-substitute-for-a-time-machine-backup-with-your-mac.html

    As for whether using Dropbox will slow your Mac, it depends on what you mean. Anything running on your Mac will use resources, so the answer of "will X slow my Mac" is always true. So it is a matter of will the benefits outweigh that. I can't say without knowing how much you value using Dropbox. But in general Dropbox shouldn't slow your Mac very much at all. If a file happens to be on Dropbox and not cached locally and you try to open it, then it will take some time (1 second, 2 minutes? depends on the file size and your Internet speed) to open that particular file.

    John Russell
    1 year ago

    As you might imagine, a number of senior citizens I try to help have old, slow machines. There are probably many pieces of advice here that would help me help them. Thanks a million for this wonderful video.

    Jonathan
    1 year ago

    Gary, would you consider offering similar videos for speeding up an iPad and iPhone?

    1 year ago

    Jonathan: Not too much to do on an iPhone or iPad. The apps are all isolated from each other and you can't have strange extensions and background processes.

    Alan Dorfman
    1 year ago

    I am running an older version of IOS on a iMac. In the video your Memory Pressure the "Green Bar" in Activity Monitor runs the full length of the box, in mine it is only about 3/4 of the way.

    1 year ago

    Alan: Do you mean from left to right? Wait and it will fill up over time.

    Wendee
    1 year ago

    67 year old woman here... all videos were running slow for months. I followed all your instructions and everything is working great now. Thanks so much for spending the time to explain to ordinary non-tech people what to do to help their macs. You really are Mac Most!

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